The terrible thing

If I could explain what I feel, I don't know that it would help me at this point. I realize that not-thinking about what this time of year really is, has affected me, hopefully temporarily. I can't think clearly. I forget the most obvious things. I can't tell right from left. Ideas drop out of my head and I'm left standing, grasping for them, in front of my loved ones. They understand. They are patient with me. I am so lucky to have these friends and this family. I know it. Not just the ones who knew me before I lost Jesse, but the ones I only know because I lost Jesse.

I suppose it's possible I would have met these new friends either way, but I wasn't the same person when Jesse was still alive. I didn't have a big hole blasted through me that anyone could look into. I protected myself. Now I can't. I have to find ways to go from that introspective, self-reliant person to one who reaches out to others, who is weak and fragile and open. The terrible thing is that I had to lose Jesse to lose what kept me from the world. That's not to say that Jesse had anything to do with my introversion, far from it. In order to love Jesse I had to change throughout his life. As my firstborn, he was the person who took me from the stupor of my postponed girlhood to full adult parenthood. He made it possible by his existence, for his brother to be born. He made me look at the world, and at myself and take responsibility for my role in it all.

And here I sit, unable to grab a train of thought and ride it, afraid to say what I feel because I know what will come out of me. I already know that what I need is time. And activity. Things I can throw into the abyss until it seals itself. I just want this part to be over. I want to-- I can't say "be myself again" because I've learned that isn't a stable concept. I want to be back on the track I thought I was on, just a few short weeks ago.