The Holidays are here.

Painful time.

And I have shingles. Painful stuff.

I feel tired and miserable, my sciatic nerve burns. But I told the doctor it was a three on the 1-10 scale. Most people report shingles as a 10. But I think I already live at a steady six every day. Maybe a 5. Sometimes a ten, but usually it thrums in the background, mid-level. Accompanying me every minute of every day. I don’t think I can experience pain like other people. It’s confusing. I DO feel pain, it’s just that it’s buried under so much other pain it’s like “okay here’s more.”

Holidays. My second set. Unbelievable.

I’m buying gifts and wrapping and putting up lights outside. No tree. I can’t go through his ornaments and remember better days. It makes me cry. Will I ever think of him and not cry?

Darle is coming for a visit next week. She’s another mother. I’m looking forward to her visit. I don’t have to pretend to care about the stuff “normal” people care about.

But it’s also nerve wracking. I don’t remember how to be a good hostess. I’ve trained my brain not to think outside of my immediate tasks: work, game, work, game, work… I barely get my laundry done because it interrupts my brain distraction games.

Sometimes I get a “Tsskk..” in group meetings because I run from grief, hard and fast. I don’t know how else to do it and keep breathing. Im supposed to lean into it, whatever that means.

December 19th will be twenty months. It sounds like a long time but sometimes it feels like yesterday. I catch a glimpse of his picture on the wall and I feel a sharp intake of breath. “Can this be real?”

It is real to other people, not so much to me, I think. That’s where I fail to meet expectations. I should be used to the idea by now.

But I’m stuck in a whorl of thoughts that bombard me every single day… where exactly is heaven, why didn’t I say I love you the very last time, are cardinals really a sign, why did I cremate him, are the ashes in my keepsake urn really his, are they his foot or his head, why didn’t I know he was taking his last breath, did he know he was taking his last breath, why didn’t she help him, how could she just lay there and let him die, why didn’t I have a premonition, did it hurt, was he scared, did he need me, what was I doing at that exact moment, could I have done something different, why did the policeman come alone, why did he try to leave me, maybe if I hadn’t divorced his father, why didn’t I react to the picture of the thermometer, why did I trust him to know when he was sick enough to call 911, why did I trust her, why didn’t I go get him, can he see me, why can’t I fee him, can he see Beau, oh what he’s missing, Beau needs him, is he okay with memory hill, why haven’t I ordered him a stone yet, do I put my name on it too, why don’t memorial candles last as long as they’re supposed to, why isn’t he here so I can discuss all this with him.

Every day. These things and a thousand more roll through my mind when I’m trying to work, when I’m trying to talk to people.

You might be discussing football, but I’m going back over the things I’ve gone back over a thousand times before and a thousand times to come.

I’m stuck in that day and see no way out.