So yesterday I lost half a day because I went to Macy's.
I was shopping for the perfect shoulder bag to wear with my giant Rick Steves backpack. But I had to walk through menswear first. And I saw this year's Hawaiian shirts and my brain went, "Will would like one of those shirts ... we could get it for him ... if he weren't DEAD!. Forever! And he's not coming back."
And the rest of the day I had crying spells -- in my car, in the house, in front of the TV which was playing old episodes of NCIS and Midsomer Murders. My younger sister named this experience the "Hawaiian Shirt Moment" when I finally called her shortly before I went to bed. It was good to hear her voice. She is a widow and has also experienced these moments, as have all grief stricken people, I think. That moment when you're OK, when you're not planning to think about the lost Other, but then, whammo, something reminds you.
My therapist says that grief is the relationship I have with Will now. My friend Stacey, when I texted her yesterday, told me to "pivot". But if I pivot from Grief, it feels like pivoting away from love, the only person who has ever seemed to love me for mySelf, even though he disapproved of parts of that Self. He was a difficult man and I am an emotion driven (Enneagram Type 4) lunatic but we fit each other. There will be nobody else for me. Everyone else I've ever met or loved has wanted me to "fit" their ideas of what I should be. And fuck that. I'm not working to "fit" another person ever again.
And, yes, there's also my lack of attractiveness. I'm old and fat and out of shape so there's also no point in me looking for anyone just to be disappointed and then grieve more. Also, I have way too much ink on my skin for most people of my generation.
I'm not special in my experience. This is how so many lonely old Norté American's live. We are not a family oriented people. What family I have wasn't at Will's funeral and don't call or connect with me unless I contact them first. This is not strange because as children we girls were all forced into family relationships in ways that weren't fun so it's natural to reject that. Also, as boomers, we were taught that our own lives were the most important. We were called the "Me Generation" and at least one researcher has found that we are generally more narcissistic than millennials. I have experienced a kind of negative narcissism ("yes, everything that goes wrong is my fault and I'm a bad person") since childhood and am self-absorbed. When I'm in mental pain I generally beat myself up for being so stupid as to be experiencing mental pain.
My self-absorption led to a misunderstanding of how friendship works in America among white folks. There were a number of people who I thought of as friends who didn't contact me when I was in the deep depths of widowhood and needed connection. At this point hearing from them in any way is less fun then talking with a complete stranger at a supermarket because, in a very un-Christian way, I carry rage and resentment.
But people were there. People are there. If I'd called, if I call, I wouldn't, I won't be alone. I know that. I may be an asshole but I'm not an idiot. There are people who think they like me and people want to be good and good people respond to cries for help so if I asked for help it would be given. But if I called as often as I need help they would get angry at me.
And this did happen. Shortly after Will died, a close friend got angry with me for asking for more help than he could give me. He got angry. He pointed fingers. He said I lacked perspective. Well, if that's how somebody I loved and had lunch with once a month for years was going to treat me, why should I reach out to anyone else? I learned my lesson -- reach out, get punched.
So I just don't know how to do friendship. My crazy brain has wanted the people who I thought of as friends to be present without my asking. I wanted people who I'd spent so much time with to know that I was broken and in pain without me having to ask. That a person from a family with a suicide, a person who has been treated for depression for 30 years, might need some comforting after her partner of 50 years has died. But that's not how friendship relationships work.
Yet my brain has had trouble dealing with that knowledge. When I think about what an asshole I am and how people don't like assholes and how I'm going to need to live the rest of my life alone, I get sad. Even with the ketamine therapy, with the psilocybin therapy, my brain still goes to the old neural cow-paths of imagining people finally missing me and saying, "If only I'd known."
I wanted people to see that I wasn't just waving.
And I feel shame and embarrassment about my need. About the way my brain works. About my pain. About my refusal to beg people to care about me.
I didn't have that kind of caring relationship with anybody but Will. And he's gone. When I told Stacey about my loneliness and expectations Stacey very intelligently told me that I seemed to want a partner, not a friend. She was right. And the only partner for me is Will. So it sounds like I'm choosing my own suffering. And why should ANYONE but a therapist talk with a person who is choosing their own suffering. Fortunately, I have enough money to pay to have someone care about me. And that is a blessing. I'm lucky to have access to therapy.
And I also have the presence in the house.
Last night, the presence touched the bed near my head and I reached my hand out into air, hoping the presence would physically touch ME so I could "be sure." Of course nothing touched my hand reaching out in the dark.
"weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning."
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