Context: Here's a thing that I
wrote almost a month ago. I finally gathered the wherewithal to give
it a half-assed edit and post it.
March 5th, 2020—9:30am
I am currently sitting in the
observation area of a crematorium with my daughter and my niece.
Dopesmoker, by Sleep, is
playing on the headphones and is accompanied by the roar of the oven
on the other side of the window.
The past three
weeks have been difficult to say the least but at least I'm here to
see my mother off to the very end. It's a two to three hour process
to reduce the person that gave birth to me down to a cookie jar full
of calcium. She went fast and there was little pain once the meds
kicked in. I'd much rather have that for her than the long drawn out
struggle that was lined up in front of her.
I stepped back
from the planning of the arrangements in order to give other family
members that showed up to help something to fill their time and help
to express their own grief by lending a hand. Stepping back will
also give me a minute to gather some much needed solitude.
Over the next
three days, I'm going to be surrounded by people that want to express
their own grief and sympathy in my general direction and I have no
idea how I'm going to handle that because I don't know where to put
my own truckload of grief. There are only so many times that I can
hear, “I'm sorry for your loss,” before it starts to turn into
background noise.
Having a very low
tolerance for human interaction is probably not the best place be
through all of this and will wear on my patience by the time this is
all over. Trying to hold it together until this is done has been
nearly impossible. The quiet moments through the day are when the
weight hits me hardest. Trying to get through to the next day and
the one after that.
Things will slow
down. Old routines will reemerge. Trying to remember will become
the challenge as time moves on. On my phone, I still have the last
voicemail that she left me. I haven't been able to bring myself to
listen to it. And that's okay because it will take me a while to
find that stupid headphone adapter so I can plug my iPhone into my
stereo and make a proper recording of it.
Blackstar,
by David Bowie, is up next and I'm sure I'm about to turn into a
puddle because I am a glutton for punishment.
March
7th,
2020—7:00pm
After
a whirlwind three days of visitations, a service and a luncheon, the
job is done. I'm sitting alone in my house and don't know what to do
with myself. I've been operating through this weird, bleary eyed
exhaustion over the past few weeks and now that I have a moment to
relax I can't.
By
the end of the first night of visitation, I was light headed and in a
daze. So many hands were shaken and countless hugs were received. I
saw a lot of faces that I hadn't seen in years and a lot more people
that I had no idea who they were. The entire evening went by in a
blur. At least Onion Maiden was still open by the time I was back in
the area because there was no way I was going to function long enough
to make anything to eat.
Friday
was the long day with the two hour visitation in the afternoon
followed by a two hour dinner break and another two hour session in
the evening. It was such a flurry of activity that I didn't have a
chance to actually talk to anybody in a meaningful way and can't
really remember anything that happened during the two visitations.
One
of my relatives that lives near the funeral home offered to have
everyone over for dinner so we wouldn't get stuck at any of the
nearby restaurants. I'm grateful that he did that so everyone else
was taken care of but I needed to duck out in order to get away from
the masses for a few minutes.
That
plan went to shit almost immediately. My desire to have a quiet
table for three suddenly became a table for eight. I ended up having
to stay in character over dinner instead of being able to decompress
for an hour or so and to return to my natural state of being a
miserable prick for a while.
Earlier
today was the last hour of visitation followed by the service and the
luncheon. Even though it was only a few hours ago, I can't really
remember any details of the events. Exhaustion and trauma are funny
that way. More than likely, it will all start coming back to me over
the next few days and weeks once I have a chance to catch my breath.
After
lunch, we had to go back to the funeral home to pick up the last of
the flowers and give her one last ride home. Over the past few weeks
while she was in the hospital her main goal was to make it back home
so she could spend the last of her time with her family and friends
but she never made it home.
Trying
to put this into words has been like pulling teeth. My brain doesn't
want to do anything besides shut down and not think about anything
for a long time. I find myself staring at the floor every so often
and I have to shake myself out of it to try to regain some sort of
focus. There is really nothing to say and nothing that can be
done about any of this.
The
feelings of my own mortality and the streamlined manner in which I
live that this has stirred up has been less than helpful. I can't
blame anyone other than myself for getting me to where I am. Sitting
in a house by myself not knowing how to process a traumatic brain
injury's worth of grief and sadness. Not really feeling anything
because I am feeling everything at once.
Fuck
it.
