Tomorrow will be 11 months.
It's almost been a year and when I think about that day it still scares me. Even though I've lived through it, I've survived the pain it brought. It still terrifies me. I can see the two men standing at my door with such clarity it's as if they were standing in front of me now. I try not to think of that day because of how haunting it becomes. The knock, the numbness, screaming just because I have no idea what else to do.
There are still accounts with his name on it. Memories of a life that will never exist again but I don't have the heart to take his name of because I feel like I'd be erasing him.
We have been away from home and it was difficult unlocking the door this time. Before we arrived I had a flashback of Christopher, barefoot, opening the door at the exact time we pulled into the driveway because that's what he did. As if he'd been sitting by the window, completely devoted to welcoming us home.
He wasn't here.
There is an emptiness inside me that will never be filled. It will remain prodigious for the rest of my life.
I'm not afraid of moving on, I've done that. One foot in front of another, I'll keep moving along. It's what I have to leave behind that continues to stab my consciousness.
Fear and opportunity, they seem to work together like pain and joy.
I've been reading the book The Goldfinch. It's about a 13 year old boy who loses his mother in the most horrific way and survives to only suffer continuing blows. One after another, after another. But he also understands love in the most profound way a 13 year old boy (or anyone I've met) can. Highly recommend it.
“That life - whatever else it is - is short. That fate is cruel but maybe not random. That Nature (meaning Death) always wins but that doesn’t mean we have to bow and grovel to it. That maybe even if we’re not always so glad to be here, it’s our task to immerse ourselves anyway: wade straight through it, right through the cesspool, while keeping eyes and hearts open. And in the midst of our dying, as we rise from the organic and sink back ignominiously into the organic, it is a glory and a privilege to love what Death doesn’t touch.”
Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch
To know we're not alone in suffering, to know that ultimately we will all die one day, embracing it and opening ourselves up to the possibility of sharing not only our happiness but our miseries. I wish I didn't have to cry alone in fear of being shamed into believing I'm not strong if I do.
Read the book.
