I was asked by someone I love who is going through a devastating, continuing loss, “How are you still alive after Gary?”
How am I still alive.
That’s a very good question.
Here’s what I told her:
Every day. Every goddamn day is a struggle. Everything that is here to remind me. Everything I experience that I want to share — and can’t. One morning it was seeing the new goslings on my drive to work that had me needing to pull the car over as I wept. Because I wanted to call him and tell him about them.
All of the new things, these things that I’m experiencing for the first time, things we’ll never share, that I’ll never get to show him, tell him. The hardships that come from not having any part of him here; not his input, his help, nothing. I’ll never see him wink at me again, never hear anything new in his voice. I have a few voicemails that I listen to, silly things, really. “You keep yarn on the porch?” Yes. Always yes.
The idea of losing the house is very real, and terrifying. Knowing I need to sell as many things as I can, the rower, the elliptical, everything. I need the stability that this place still provides. The banner I put up for his birthday years ago that looked so fun and cheery that I left it up.
I don’t know how I’m still alive.
Stubborn, I guess. Sheer force of will.
I haven’t given myself the choice.
In the meanwhile, I write. I eat like garbage, I stay up too late. I try to not fuck up my job. I try to spend time working on my website, on new work to sell, but there are days, most days, that I just cannot. I act recklessly, although somewhat less so, recently. I reach out for help in ways that aren’t good for me, no, not at all.
“Well-intentioned” but utterly thoughtless people offer all sorts of useless advice under the aegis of “just trying to help”. There is no actual thought process behind the initial logorrhea. It’s only to make themselves feel better:
Q: “Why don’t you sell the house/take in a boarder/do Airbnb?”
A: I don’t have the money to fix the house up so that I can sell it/live decently, much less offer it to someone else to live in. Also, I don’t trust strangers around Mojo and Teaz’ka. I don’t trust anyone to treat them with the same care that I do. Please stop suggesting this. I have no patience left for answering, and I just may bite the next person who asks.
Q: “Why don’t you go on disability?”
A: I’d lose the house. See above.
Q: “Why don’t you get a job closer to home/get a second job?”
A: Certainly, getting a job closer to home would help a lot with all of the time and money I spend commuting. However, there’s not going to be anything that I’m qualified for close enough to make a difference. I don’t have a degree. Working 30 hours a week at the eyeglass shop leaves me both too many and too few hours working there. Too many to make getting a second job viable without completely exhausting myself; too few to actually make anything near a living. Additionally, I barely have any time to make work for myself. Getting a second job would leave no time whatsoever, and then all I would be doing is working to pay bills and nothing else. And I really would rather die than do that ever again.
I said to her, “I understand, perhaps better than anyone you know, this loneliness you’re experiencing right now. And I am truly sorry. Because it is wretched.”
Today is 10 months since Gary died. I cannot believe that he’s been gone this long. I don’t know what to do, I still don’t know what to do. And I’m failing at everything. Except, of course, for looking strong, for faking it incredibly well. Because in the end, isn’t appearance all that anyone cares about? Not being made to feel uncomfortable in anyone’s presence? My sheer existence makes people uncomfortable.
Most recently, say, these past few months, I’ve allowed myself to be open, desperately flinging wide my arms to catch what might ever come close. Pinwheeling, windmilling, spiraling. I am being, as ever, the only way I know how. Open. Brutally honest and clear. And it is terrifying. Terrible, feeling like betrayal. But I need, am a needful thing.
And then? A small and persistent hope burns, glows. Lights me from within. Nudges gently, but firmly, guiding me. I can breathe, I can hope. This small light doesn’t burn away the cold, but it does make it bearable.
I’m embracing it, nurturing it, trying to not suffocate it, to scare it away.
The Salty Widow 