There are good days and bad when you’re dealing with grief. Everyone expects it at the start. “I’m so sorry.” “Condolences.” “Take your time.” It’s now been a month and a half since I found out. A month and three weeks since his death. Some days it barely affects me. Others are like today: everything — every little thing — is a reminder and a show of his absence.
The word games are gone. Silence is overwhelming and seems to seep into the emptiness I bear inside. I want to reach out to others, but I’m also reluctant. Nobody can fill his place, so how can it help? And the few times I try, talking to others, the sound of the voices only irritates and makes it all the more clear that he was special, that these things I wish to say were for his ears. Nobody else can help. Nobody makes it any better.
I’ve had conversations aloud with his ghost. No, he’s not there. I don’t imagine his spirit lingering for me or anyone else, but I do imagine his reactions. His laughter. His concern for my tears and my difficulties in dealing. Those “conversations” have made me cry more. And laugh, too. I don’t know that they help, though, because at the end, I realize I’m still alone and he’s still gone. I’m left swathing myself in isolation and grief. But who else could understand how I feel, truly? What we had was ours and nobody else’s.
I try to play the piano, but the notes come out wrong. It’s been so long and my fingers aren’t as strong as they once were. The songs aren’t so ingrained in me as I thought or else the music doesn’t quite fit. Too cheerful. Too dark. I plan to practice more and to get better. He never heard me play, but I wouldn’t want him to hear me play as I do now. I’ll work on it, just not when I’m seeking something from it.
Aimless, I try to become productive. To soldier through. Except, what do I know of being a soldier? Still, I try. I feel that to lose the uniqueness I treasured in a person means someone has to make up for it. Someone has to ensure that the eclectic and strange thoughts we used to share still come out. Somehow. He’d want that.
Right now, it doesn’t make me feel better, but perhaps, someday, it will.
taurgalas 