I'm Not Me Without You

***language warning***

Since you have been gone, I've become possessed by a demon of mean spiteful hatefulness. One that calls names (and NOT only in my head), cusses, and flat-out hates.

I do not like this person.

It seems unfair somehow to lay the guilt for that at your feet, but so much of what sets me off could be eased if I could just talk to you. You were always such a good listener. And you could make me laugh at my own frazzledness.
It's also true that many of the things that set me off would not exist had you just continued to exist. No necessity for a job, no homelessness, no car falling to pieces -- you'd have figured out a way to get it fixed, or helped me figure it out. You would have been more on top of the transmission fluid situation, that's for sure.

Rex, you would not believe the frequency with which I use the f word. I've probably used it more in the last two months than I ever did out whole lives together, And I call people retards in my mind, and you know that I have never used that word that way -- that I have been extremely upset by and with people who do. I've even called them fucktards, and you know how I despise that word. (While still admiring it, in a professional sort of way. It says what it means and means what it says. No one has ever needed to have it defined for them, or explained.)

I am hateful.
I am angry.
I am childish.
I am spiteful.
I am malicious.
I am ungrateful.
I am humorless.
I am negative.

And I do not like this person.

But I don't know how to find me again, anymore, ever.
I don't know if that me exists, or even if she ever did.

I kind of liked her most of the time when I thought she did exist. There were negative things, but they were all softened and leveled out by a sense of humor and a sort of loving kindness that could see the silly side and laugh at it.

I miss her, but she is so lost; so far away.
How do I get back to her?

Is That You?

Last week, I had a spate of losing things and then finding them exactly where they were supposed to be. Freaky to say the least. Most of the stuff was relatively minor -- my new pay card, my wallet, some cash, bank papers; things of that ilk. (The pay card was minor because it had not yet been activated.) The big thing was my teeth.

Through it all, I could hear you nagging, fussing, cussing -- just giving me hell for not keeping better track of my things.
Heck, you (and your mouth and opinion of me) were the reason I made myself learn to be so otganizes. A place for everything and everything in its place.

But what do you do when you've put everything in its place and it disappears then reappears exactly there?

I then had the misfortune -- or maybe good fortune -- to read a list of signs that a loved one could be letting you know they are near. The number one item was the disappearance and reappearance of significant items.

Except that I can't really see you doing that, especially not with my teeth. I even had to work all night one night without them. Just doesn't seem like something you'd do. (Charlie might, but he can go haunt someone else. You can tell him I said so.)

I have mixed feelings about that. I wish you were here; I like the idea if you being near; but I would so much rather think of you being off somewhere, just being. No work, no worries, love and joy and peace -- all that good stuff.
Yeah, I want you to help me with all my little problems but don't want you to kn ow about any of them. Especially not the ones I keep talking over with you.

Yeah,

Well, anyway, if it's you, send me flowers, okay? Like you did when you were first  gone. Please don't hide things from me.
It's hard enough living every day without your help.
Without you.

On My Mind; In My Heart

I've had you on my mind a lot lately. Actively, awfully, achingly on my mind. I suppose it's the weather. The horrible hot humidity that was always so hard on you. (And it's just now the middle of June!)

And having to work and no one to decompress with afterward. Work has been really tough the last three weeks or so. I'm trying to do three people's work -- which is my usual job -- but now I'm having to be at all three parts of the job at exactly the same time! And stay on them. It's just too hard. And I can't do it, but then I go on and do it anyway.

You know.

No luck finding my own place. Who knew it would be so hard. Part of that problem is the working, and the third shift working. I'm not "in place" to get the new newspapers every week, or to make the phone calls bright and early in the business day.
I have lots of family and friends who are trying to help, but they can't help much with the timing thing. That one is all on me.

I think of you when I have a hard time breathing every time I open the drive thru window.
I think of you when I wake up gasping for air because the room is so hot.
I think of you when I have to choose breathing or sleeping. (Or standing, or sweeping, or moving.)
I think of you when I hurt, because I think that you would be unhappy to see me this way.

And then I am glad you are not here to see it, because you deserve your hard won peace.

I thought of you Memorial Day, but I may have been the only person in the entire store who worked all four days of that holiday weekend. I want to take Hailey to your resting place. She has asked about you/it. Just haven't made it  yet.

Rex, I wish you could know how grateful I am that I had you for so long. And for the way you let me be me, even when you couldn't understand where that me-ness was coming from. (I hardly know myself, sometimes.)

It's such a horrible aching loss not having you. Not having that.

I can only hope -- since I can't change anything now -- that I let you be you in the same way. And I hope you know how much love there was for that you.

I miss you.

Finally in pictures.

I Want You Back

I want you back.
You've been away long enough.
I need you.
I miss you.

Come back.

I know you can't, but do it anyway.
It wouldn't be the first time you've done the impossible, now would it?
You were told once you'd never walk again, right?

Some days I still think I may wake to find this is all a convoluted dream.

I sure wish I could believe that on these lost other days.

18 Months Gone.

It happened the other day.
I didn't consciously know it, but some inner part of my mind or soul has been counting and keeping track.
Some part of me knew it, without my knowing I knew.

I was mean and hateful and bitter for two days -- April 15 and 16. Sometime Late on the 16th, I realized it was the 16th of the month.

And then I knew.

18 months without you.

18 months alone in the loneliest way.

18 months, just -- 18 months.

Is it only 18 months already, or is it finally 18 months?

I don't know.
Don't suppose it matters.
18 months is just a fact; a word; a number.
An anniversary.
The kind that needs acknowledged but is nothing to celebrate.

People sometimes wonder what I miss the most about you.
What a silly question,.
I miss the you-ness of you, not just your parts.

But I think of you not having to draw breath, not having to choose between eating or breathing.
Those are the thoughts I cling to and try to find unselfish comfort in.

But I still miss your presence in my life.

And I surely truly wish I could take or find or have new pictures of you to share. The old ones are so old.

Easter 2

It's so not right without you here. It just is (or isn't.)

Last night, I should have been coming home from work (if I was working) and got busy setting up Easter baskets for the kids. I should have been standing at the table, sorting out the gifts, sharing out the candies, arranging the contents, while you sat there commenting on everything and eating all the Reese's eggs. You should be sitting there suggesting places to hide the plastic eggs, and digging through your stashes for dollar bills and quarters to put in them. Some of your suggestions -- most of them -- would be silly. A few would be genius.
You should be here to see the children find the eggs and to see their faces light up when they discover the surprises inside.

The table was there, the candies were there  (except for Reese's eggs), the special gifts for the babies. The baskets -- not our purchase, though. There was even a leftover basket for the grown ups.
Everything was there.
Except you.

It also wasn't our home. That, too, is gone.
We have no home, but then, there is no us.
I guess we don't need one.

I've missed you so these last few days. It breaks my heart that I couldn't "pull a rabbit out of the hat" and get those babies some Easter outfits. It just breaks my heart.

And I am heart-sore without you. If that heart break had happened, it would somehow not be so grievous if you were here to share it with. Although, had you been here, it wouldn't have happened. You would have figured something out that I couldn't.
Not being you, I don't know what that would have been. But there would have been something.

Heart sick, heart sore, and heart broke -- just another holiday for this one you left behind.