Category Archives: Just me

Acceptance…

It’s a bitch. I’m not very good at it.

So here is my attempt number 817:

Yesterday I was trimming a mat for a painting using an exacto knife. It took a while. Ever since my middle finger on my right hand has been numb.

Is this a permanent thing? This forever numbness? If so, is that okay?

How do I accept the limitations my body imposes without sliding into despair?

How do I live life as a branch moved by the stream instead of the dog -with plans of it’s own- trying to drag the branch onto the shore?

Dead people are rude…

They never call, they never write, they never stop in to visit.

This pithy comment you used to say to me was usually accompanied by a melancholy sigh as you remembered those you had lost. Now it is you who are the rude one Daddy dearest.

It has been over a year since you had the temerity to die in my arms, unexpectedly and dramatically, making as big a splash in your death as you were wont to do in your life.

I’ve cried, I’ve failed to sleep most nights, I’ve thought of all the loving things I’d like to say to you and the things I did right and all the things I should have done differently.

I’ve been out to visit my brother twice. He’s been home to see us three times. Your absence is a glue or a rubber band, yanking us back together in a way a life time of children and successes could not.

I am getting sicker. I am glad you aren’t here to see it. I am equally certain you died knowing it was going to happen. You were nobody’s fool, we have known for a while that sicker was in the pipeline, that a cure was no longer on the table, that the future held scary uncertainties. As much as I still long to have you here to talk to about all this or to hold my hand I am glad you don’t have to actually see it.

It’s the small things. The small comforts. Finding an article you wrote. Wearing your sweater. Listening to an interview you gave on CPS.

You are missed my dear one. Terribly.

You are also very, very rude.

Oh Father…

It’s the waiting. 

the interminable waiting for you to return, 

to enter the room, 

to open a door, 

to call my nickname or ask me for something. 

it’s the feeling

of a breath not fully taken 

not fully released, 

held eternally in expectation

while time moves on without you. 

it’s the knowing 

that given a choice you would return

you would call 

you would come back.

you have no choices. 

it’s sinking feelings 

it’s desperate feelings

it’s lonely and sorrowful

hurt beyond repair feelings. 

it’s hearing a word only you used to say

smelling your favorite food, 

seeing a project you would like,

hearing a joke you would laugh at,

singing to a song you would love

and crumbling 

internally

out of sight

little by little or boulder by beastly boulder

it’s closing my eyes

slowing my mind

so I can try and remember

the feel of your hand in mine. 

the sound of your voice in my ear. 

It’s the wretched emptiness

where you once were

that cuts me

over and over

while my insistent heart waits for you to return. 


6/2/23

MEwegen