Saturday, November 29, 2008

Mourning

For those who don't know, Ronni passed away on August 10, 2008, after her two-and-a-half year battle with kidney cancer. She was 54 years young.

I don't see a reason to blog about it, but I have spent a little time journaling. Putting my feelings in a journal feels like a private diary, while blogging feels like a highway billboard. Don't take it personally, but my private feelings are mine and will remain so, except when I share them with people I select, as opposed to the universe.

I will say, anyway, that I am completely miserable. It's been more than three months, six months since the decline to death began. If anything, I'm feeling worse as time goes forward. It comes in waves: I'll spend days off-and-on in tears, have a deep, sobbing, smack-the-pillow session, then vegetate for several days until it happens again. I don't know how to go on. I have so many regrets. Keeping busy helps, but not always. I went for counseling once so far, didn't click, will try again.

The things that have comforted me:
  • Late afternoon on the stormy day of the funeral, I looked at the weather radar. Clouds all around, except that a clear patch in the shape of a heart opened around the time she was buried. It moved across the island and broke. I see it as her message to me.
  • Towards the end of the shiva week I came home alone, sat on my bed looking at the hospital bed she died in, and broke down. I asked aloud all the usual "why" questions. I could swear she gave me the answers. Mostly "That's just the way it works."
  • Coming home from services a few nights later, over the horizon rose a beautiful bronze nearly-full moon. It made me laugh. I could hear her say, "I guess you'll be alright after all, if you can still see the beauty in the world."
People tell me to remember the good, to be thankful for the love I had for so many years. I can't yet. My heart is broken and it hasn't had time to heal.

I won't be posting often.

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