What was important was the kindness I've been treated with in that office. The empathy, the gentleness. Possibly there is something wrong with me but I'll always remember the day of my extraction as being a very, very good day. The relief of getting it over with, the drugs, the way my husband cooked me a chicken-pot pie that night, how good it tasted, the feeling of needing to do nothing but lie in bed and sleep and dream.
I was in the middle of my unmedicated anxiety then and that day and night were such a break in my panic. Sure, yeah, it was the drugs but who cares? It was like after spending months drowning in an endless dark sea I was suddenly washed up on an island of paradise with cool palms shading me and sweet water to drink and a cloudless sky.
Well.
I took May some eggs because I haven't seen her since I turned sixty and I missed her too much and I ate lunch at her restaurant, sat outside at my own table and read a magazine article and Taylor made me the best Greek salad and May kept my tea glass filled and there was a breeze and it was lovely. We got to chat for a few minutes and hug and it was all just what I needed.
Then I went to a real running shoe store and the nice kid there helped me pick out my shoes after watching me walk and I got insoles too and it cost a shitpile but with any luck, I won't need to buy new shoes to walk in for at least a year. I went into the antique store next door, thinking maybe to find Jessie and Vergil a housewarming gift but after twenty minutes in there I had to bolt. Too much, too much. Way too much.
Groceries, and then home. I've made bread and you should never make bread when your heart is heavy because your bread will be heavy too, the lump of dough is rising at the speed of the reign of the dinosaurs and we'll be lucky to eat by ten tonight.
Jessie and Vergil will be here tomorrow and we're going to do a final walk-through their house tomorrow afternoon and I'm not sure when the signing is but either Thursday or Friday. I will take pictures. Maybe we will go out to eat afterwards to celebrate.
So it goes. It keeps going. I am glad of that. There's been an awful lot on social media about Robin William's death, of course, and I am enraged at the constant barrage of "if you need help, call someone, reach out a hand, get help, etc. etc." Do we not think he had not? Did the man not claim Oliver Sacks as one of his friends?
Whatever.
Here's Maurice.
"Uh, if you look behind the toilet, you might find it."
I didn't ask questions. I just went and looked behind the toilet. I found half of it. The other half was in the trash can beside the toilet. I took the two pieces to Owen and I said, "Why did you do this?"
"I really don't know," he said. I believed him. I understand.
Here's a picture I took yesterday of Owen and Gibson and Nicey in the bamboo jungle. Owen can climb a stalk of bamboo seven or eight feet into the air. He is a monkey. As are we all.
I am blurry today today too.
Here is a picture, also from yesterday, of Gibson sitting on his beloved Boppa's lap.
No need to torture this metaphor any longer.
Let's all just tell each other we love each other, okay?
I'll start.
I love you.
Mary
I love you! I love love love you!!!! I'm so glad you came in today, and I'm so glad I got to sit a bit, minutes at a time with you. Oh Mama! You know.
ReplyDelete"I really don't know." I feel that.
ReplyDeleteI hope you feel better soon, sometimes things are good but we can't really see them clearly.
ReplyDeleteThen some rays of light appear.
I have been feeling the same way about Robin Williams. It seems all the man DID was get help- friends, therapy, rehab, AA, and tons of giving back, heavily involved with St. Jude's... I think people need to believe that there is a perfect answer for everyone. Mr. Williams was bipolar. There isn't a perfect answer. xo
ReplyDeleteyes, and I love you. Love feels so much better tan fear and anger and hate. why do people put so much energy into those?
ReplyDeleteIt's all just so fucking sad. I have been dark and gray and heavy too -so heavy with a pit in my stomach for the last full week now. I don't know -just everything. I really don't know either, like Owen :)
ReplyDeleteI do know I love you, and you were in my dream last night.
Loving you too!
ReplyDeleteThat photo of the boys and the bamboo and the chicken is remarkable. Especially when you click on it and just look at it for a while, which I did. It helped me to process a bit more of the Williams thing. I'm just a firm believer in there being no answers to most things that puzzle us. I have watched a bunch of videos of Williams today -- the best of his funnies. He was so talented, so damn funny. He made me giggle -- not just darkly but joyfully. I think that's possible. To be both joyful and suicidal. I'm going to hope that he held both at least part of the time.
ReplyDeleteLove you. Yeah - Robin Williams did reach out. He just couldn't do it any longer. The one thing we all have control of is our bodies and if he wanted to end his life, while it is sad, at least leave him be about that choice. Jeez people. And Owen - behind the toilet. That Boy!
ReplyDeleteAwesome Cat Mama here--
ReplyDeleteMaurice will outgrow the biting and scratching. If she weren't basically so friendly, I'd say she'd remain bitey and scratchy--but she's an instinctive people-lover who's still young and semi-feral, and you're still taming her. Don't yell at her for her behavior(she thinks she's being reasonable and will think you're an arbitrary tyrant), but respect her boundaries and she will come to respect and trust you. (Well, eventually. Could take a while.)
And hey, there's stuff you never said about chickens. The sweet hubbub of sound the emanates from the flock when they're eager for release from the coop! The way one will hop over another if it's in the way and there's no way around! How they look utterly ridiculous, like tiny ostriches, when they come running towards you! So I had to stay at a B&B farm to learn these things.
--ACM
May- I know. Lord, how I love you.
ReplyDeleteMr. Downtown- We all do that. I love you.
Jenny Woolf- So true. Just keep passing the open windows...
Maggie May- Seriously. He did it all to try and get help, help himself. People are so quick to reach for the glib answer, the cliched response.
Ellen Abbott- I don't know but we do. Anger makes us feel powerful? Sometimes.
Love can make us feel vulnerable.
SJ- I hope it was a good dream, love.
Big mamabird- Back at you, sweetie!
Elizabeth- I am so sure that he did. He was probably a master at holding both things at once.
Jill- I agree. Suicide is horrible but it is the choice some people make and as such, what can we say?
ACM- Well, I've had cats who were a lot more bitey and scratchy that Maurice. Trust me. Who grew up to be quite affectionate. And actually, I have mentioned the sound the chickens make when want to be let out of the coop quite often and the funny way they run as well. My chickens don't really need to fly over each other as they aren't that crowded but they can definitely fly when they want to.
I love you too.
ReplyDeleteWishing you all the best at the dentist.
Been out of town for a while and just now catching up. You can get (FREE!!!) end rolls of newsprint at the Tallahassee Democrat (drive around to the back where the loading dock is) on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays around 3:15 - there's usually a few people vying for the rolls, but everyone is polite and makes sure that no one goes home empty handed. A Democrat employee rolls out a cart of different width rolls - some have a bunch of paper on them, some not so much.
ReplyDeleteDenise- Thank you, dear. It went well.
ReplyDeleteJucie- Awesome! I gotta go get me some of that! Surely appreciate the heads-up!
Sometimes there is nothing that can be done for someone. I think it's hard to fathom the pain that a person is in who is suicidal. No options remain sometimes.
ReplyDelete