17 Weeks Today

  Today is painful, there is no way around it. The last couple of days I have been surprisingly ok - but, much as that respite is welcomed, I remind myself that it is not the goal - I am  not trying to hurry through this necessary passage, nor shove the pain of Dan's loss down into the subconscious, to fester and damage me in ways unforeseen.

But, still, today is pretty goddamn bad.

Here is what I wrote to him yesterday; shared today, as all the candles, tea and tears are not helping much.

 

"Good morning, my darling, or afternoon, I lose track of time these days. Is there time where you are? The poets tell us no, and the mystics concur. Time here, drags or flies, it never behaves reasonably at all. Were you here yesterday? or a lifetime ago...or both....

I am distracted by sadness again today...but I wanted to tell you...earlier I was outside, as you know I love so much...watering your rose, and a butterfly landed on the big field mustard I've allowed to bust through the concrete, grow and bloom... despite being a "weed" I could not bring myself to kill it.

A beautiful, perfect swallowtail, such as you would be if you choose that shape to visit me - and I stood there

transfixed
enchanted

for a moment radiant with that same joy I used to feel all the time, daily; looking at you, or just being with you watching the natural world, bugs and buds and the falling, sacred light on the willows....one of our Sit Spots in the woods, gathering mullein flowers...pine gathering days...JOY.

I felt that, Dan, just for a moment I really did.    Everything beautiful is so tied up with you.

But the world insists on beauty and life .... and I am still, and forever, without you.

Back to work with me, and living breath to breath - wandering the hours in this strange landscape of life without my heart. I feed the ever-worried cats, I type out recipes, I force myself to rest. It remains, a place of dim light and grey visions of days past, haunted images and sorrow....fleeting respite, watching telly, with that horrible empty space beside me on the couch.

but - there was that moment earlier today..a creature on a flower, and - my heart DID sing. A song of praise, and awe, and so much love.

I thought you'd like to know.