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| Interior of a ceramic kiln littered with the confetti-like shards of a misfired piece. |
(TW, just... bad things. Medical stuff, death, dark times.)
Things haven't been good for a while. This was not a long drop and a short stop - This was a train buckling and zigzagging it’s way off the rails at 24 miles an hour, spitting barrels of naphtha into a protected wetland, while on fire.
This last year was the worst year of my life. I don't have the words or the disposition to package it any more nicely than: My mother lost her ten year battle with cancer.
The dumbest part is that, through a decade of this shit, we still never saw it coming. She had always beaten it... therefore she would always beat it, right? Until she didn't. By the time the doctors ever impressed upon us that she would not be recovering, or said the word “terminal” it was a matter of days. It was a brutal and uncompromising murder at the hands of a ruthless killer.
I did not exist this last year. Words didn't exist. Nothing existed.
I want to say I took solace in my craft, but I didn't. I want to say that I worked hard and accomplished goals, but I didn't. All I did was hang on by my toes, and scream when no one could hear me.
I have not breathed in almost a year. The first Thanksgiving without my mother, the first Christmas, the first of her birthdays passing without her. A vacuous, empty, hole. 2018 was the longest decade of my life, and the shortest, ugliest, weekend. I only remember the smallest bits, here and there, most of them fairly awful. I remember only scant moments in void where anything at all was or is... and I hear that's actually pretty normal.
I wish I could speak more on it, honestly. I wish I could put it through that wistful blog filter, but I can't. There's nothing to squeeze out of this that is not turning personal suffering into inspo-porn, and no thank you.
I have not breathed in almost a year. The first Thanksgiving without my mother, the first Christmas, the first of her birthdays passing without her. A vacuous, empty, hole. 2018 was the longest decade of my life, and the shortest, ugliest, weekend. I only remember the smallest bits, here and there, most of them fairly awful. I remember only scant moments in void where anything at all was or is... and I hear that's actually pretty normal.
I wish I could speak more on it, honestly. I wish I could put it through that wistful blog filter, but I can't. There's nothing to squeeze out of this that is not turning personal suffering into inspo-porn, and no thank you.
I survived. I may, in fact, even be alive. There may be a day when living becomes thriving. I don't know yet. At least I've said the thing, and if words come back maybe I will say more things.
I've lost a parent, so I know how much there is just nothing to say when it happens. But thank you all the same for saying it. I hope you continue to survive in your own way.
ReplyDeleteIt's that way. Thank you for the kindness.
DeleteI can't pretend I can offer you anything, because I don't know you, but thank you. Thank you for the work you've put into surviving and for sharing your perspective/s. I can't pretend you should feel better because of this, but it felt too wrong to leave this echoing in silence. You are (in some small measure) heard and your existence is valued to an unreasonable degree by at least one stranger.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much. "Echoing silence" is an apt term. I left a lot of that myself, hesitating to post this and not wanting to post anything else. Hopefully the silence tapers off.
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