I am thinking at these times, we fall back into the zone, John, back under the spell of wondering about you, why you went and where you might be now and how we are still feeling the hurt nearly two years on.
Mr LaMontagne expresses it perfectly:-
I never learned to count my blessings, I choose instead to dwell in my disasters.
I walk on down the hill, through grass, grown tall and brown
And still its hard somehow to let go of my pain.
On past the busted back of that old and rusted Cadillac that sinks into this field, collecting rain.
Will I always feel this way ?
So empty, so estranged.
And of these cut-throat busted sunsets, these cold and damp white mornings
I have grown weary.
If through my cracked and dusted dime-store lips I spoke these words out loud
Would no one hear me ?
Well I looked my demons in the eyes,laid bare my chest, said "Do your best, destroy me.
You see, I've been to hell and back so many times, I must admit you kind of bore me."
There's a lot of things that can kill a man, there's a lot of ways to die,
Listen, some already did that walked beside me.
There's a lot of things I don't understand,
Why so many people lie.
Its the hurt I hide that fuels the fire inside me.
Will I always feel this way ?
So empty, so estranged.
Well ?
Sunday 14 December 2008
Thursday 11 December 2008
Mean Streets
Your favourite movie of all time - along with any other of Italian gangster genre populated by Pacino, Pesce et al.
It always seemed fairly evident to me having seen the movie why it should be entitled so - then I started reading around the grief and loss I felt when you left and I discovered the man: CS Lewis, a scholar and writer of note.
He tells us about the world being a "mean street replete with human squalor"; I'd like to add to that a further thought:- replete with human squalor and emotional bankrupts. Sounds about right to me.
I am back in the blog zone John, back here in the parallel universe where we spent a lot of time communing.
I think of the Mean Streets you inhabited and understand that you had a great deal to contend with; too much evidently. You sidestepped as much as you could, but every now and again you would trip over some of that paucity and unkindness. The more you encountered, the harder you tried to overcome it.
And you didn't.
You gave up on this.
We instead keep tripping through those mean streets.
It always seemed fairly evident to me having seen the movie why it should be entitled so - then I started reading around the grief and loss I felt when you left and I discovered the man: CS Lewis, a scholar and writer of note.
He tells us about the world being a "mean street replete with human squalor"; I'd like to add to that a further thought:- replete with human squalor and emotional bankrupts. Sounds about right to me.
I am back in the blog zone John, back here in the parallel universe where we spent a lot of time communing.
I think of the Mean Streets you inhabited and understand that you had a great deal to contend with; too much evidently. You sidestepped as much as you could, but every now and again you would trip over some of that paucity and unkindness. The more you encountered, the harder you tried to overcome it.
And you didn't.
You gave up on this.
We instead keep tripping through those mean streets.
Wednesday 3 December 2008
Detritus
The stuff that gets left behind, the mess, the tangling, what needs to picked through and at some point swept up.
I am not sure it is that easy. How would we know where to start? I think about this legacy of sadness that you left - and how we still carry it with us.
I wonder how long it will be before we accept that we should not be defined by your death - and your suicide. At times it seems impossible - we cannot undo your passing and, certainly for me, it is almost such a large part of me and who I am that I cannot see a way forward.
I am mindful that there are few who could ever reach your benchmark - which is by definition stuck at the final point of its evolution - your death.
And so we continue John, with you in our hearts and a fear that we cannot, nor will not ever quite surmount the sad legacy of your passing.
We still miss you big man.
x
I am not sure it is that easy. How would we know where to start? I think about this legacy of sadness that you left - and how we still carry it with us.
I wonder how long it will be before we accept that we should not be defined by your death - and your suicide. At times it seems impossible - we cannot undo your passing and, certainly for me, it is almost such a large part of me and who I am that I cannot see a way forward.
I am mindful that there are few who could ever reach your benchmark - which is by definition stuck at the final point of its evolution - your death.
And so we continue John, with you in our hearts and a fear that we cannot, nor will not ever quite surmount the sad legacy of your passing.
We still miss you big man.
x
Tuesday 23 September 2008
Love Life Loss
In that order I guess.
For you, maybe not sweet man. I think it might have been loss and life and then the love.
A simple summary of your existence; the compromise which continued from sometime around August 1990 - the continuial ersoion of your choices - by your own hand at times, and the clinging to the hope of some kind of new love, which arrived in the form of your only son.
And then it was not enough to sustain you; try as you might there was no easy exit from that impasse; and so you persisited. At that point you knew, as you atested to more than just me, that you were done. Your hopes for an improvement did not bear fruit and your attempts at bringing things to a better place just met with more resistence.
In summary, at this point you were lost. In too deep to make extrication easy and not strong enough to face what you knew would be the onslaught from she who would see this as a betrayal.
And your efforts at forming a new and love-filled relationship further exacerbated the pain and hurt; for all concerend I would say now.
You lost. We lost.
Endgame.
For you, maybe not sweet man. I think it might have been loss and life and then the love.
A simple summary of your existence; the compromise which continued from sometime around August 1990 - the continuial ersoion of your choices - by your own hand at times, and the clinging to the hope of some kind of new love, which arrived in the form of your only son.
And then it was not enough to sustain you; try as you might there was no easy exit from that impasse; and so you persisited. At that point you knew, as you atested to more than just me, that you were done. Your hopes for an improvement did not bear fruit and your attempts at bringing things to a better place just met with more resistence.
In summary, at this point you were lost. In too deep to make extrication easy and not strong enough to face what you knew would be the onslaught from she who would see this as a betrayal.
And your efforts at forming a new and love-filled relationship further exacerbated the pain and hurt; for all concerend I would say now.
You lost. We lost.
Endgame.
Friday 25 January 2008
Freewheeling
This is like freewheeling.
If you allow yourself some respite, you gain momentum, and in some way are able to pick up again where you left off.
I wish somebody had told you that - given you a sense of permission, so you could have given yourself some space; instead of always punishing yourself; albeit in silence.
I wanted to tell you, that as we predicted, the monstrous spectacle of your estranged spouse's behaviour rears its ugly head once again: she has now taken to claiming that your closest family members lie in wait for her as she goes to the supermarket and unleash torrents of abuse at her when she walks past.
This is intriguing to say the least, as when you were here with us in all your glory sweet man, she indulged this fantasy with you - set you up to go to the hospital and when you arrived, her equally deranged outsize sister was there hurling abuse at you, aided and abetted by her late, mother. I remember when you recounted this to me, I informed you that it sounded like a pikey sopa opera! And what surprised me was not the type of behaviour, but that you should have tolerated this for so long.
So convinced is she of her own deluded fantasies regarding this relentless imaginary abuse that she filed a police report, anticipating arrest and incarceration. Except, she forgot to check that your family were in the country at the time of the alleged incidents!
No surprises there, then, she continues to be as mad as the day you married her. My guess is that something has happened, somebody in authority has questioned perhaps her parenting skills, your son's ever increasing obesity, something; and now she needs a scapegoat.
If there is one thing we learned from your own story, it is how she never ever takes responsibility for her actions, and why should this be any different? I imagine she never stopped to think when she harassed and harangued you into submission, that she would need a replacement - that you fulfilled that need in some way, always shouldering the responsibility like the naive dutiful and frankly idiotic husband that you were; easier than fighting it all the time I guess!
Oh, and the story she fabricated to the officers in question - unbelievable! Like you had never left. How tragic your death was and how this cruelty would surely send her over the edge. Let's hope not, or the whole of Merseyside will be engulfed in a seismic wave of tsunami like proportions.
So I just wish, dear man, that you had learned to freewheel more, to not pedal so hard like your life depended on it. I wish you had come to understand that you were just one man with one will and one life, and for all that others say and do, we are only responsible for the officially dependent ones, not those who believe that there is a moral or emotional deficiency on their part that you have to prop up.
In the meantime, we try to allow ourselves a little space and time to freewheel, as the date of the first anniversary draws nearer.
And our sadness stays the same.
If you allow yourself some respite, you gain momentum, and in some way are able to pick up again where you left off.
I wish somebody had told you that - given you a sense of permission, so you could have given yourself some space; instead of always punishing yourself; albeit in silence.
I wanted to tell you, that as we predicted, the monstrous spectacle of your estranged spouse's behaviour rears its ugly head once again: she has now taken to claiming that your closest family members lie in wait for her as she goes to the supermarket and unleash torrents of abuse at her when she walks past.
This is intriguing to say the least, as when you were here with us in all your glory sweet man, she indulged this fantasy with you - set you up to go to the hospital and when you arrived, her equally deranged outsize sister was there hurling abuse at you, aided and abetted by her late, mother. I remember when you recounted this to me, I informed you that it sounded like a pikey sopa opera! And what surprised me was not the type of behaviour, but that you should have tolerated this for so long.
So convinced is she of her own deluded fantasies regarding this relentless imaginary abuse that she filed a police report, anticipating arrest and incarceration. Except, she forgot to check that your family were in the country at the time of the alleged incidents!
No surprises there, then, she continues to be as mad as the day you married her. My guess is that something has happened, somebody in authority has questioned perhaps her parenting skills, your son's ever increasing obesity, something; and now she needs a scapegoat.
If there is one thing we learned from your own story, it is how she never ever takes responsibility for her actions, and why should this be any different? I imagine she never stopped to think when she harassed and harangued you into submission, that she would need a replacement - that you fulfilled that need in some way, always shouldering the responsibility like the naive dutiful and frankly idiotic husband that you were; easier than fighting it all the time I guess!
Oh, and the story she fabricated to the officers in question - unbelievable! Like you had never left. How tragic your death was and how this cruelty would surely send her over the edge. Let's hope not, or the whole of Merseyside will be engulfed in a seismic wave of tsunami like proportions.
So I just wish, dear man, that you had learned to freewheel more, to not pedal so hard like your life depended on it. I wish you had come to understand that you were just one man with one will and one life, and for all that others say and do, we are only responsible for the officially dependent ones, not those who believe that there is a moral or emotional deficiency on their part that you have to prop up.
In the meantime, we try to allow ourselves a little space and time to freewheel, as the date of the first anniversary draws nearer.
And our sadness stays the same.
Tuesday 15 January 2008
Half A World Away
And so we still survive you John.
Somebody asked me how I feel now that you are gone; I guess anticipating that I must have accepted your demise by now.
The answer is simple - the same! You are still dead and we are still waiting, to see if in some way you will ever return to us.
It is true to say that the legacy you left is great and all encompassing. We talk about you often and think about you more so; all for one thing: - to fill the void, to bridge the gap, to circumvent the abyss.
As they all told us, things are easier, life is easier. The struggle for control has in some way diminished, because in the end, our own sense of survival has guided us to the point where we can function again, on a daily basis; making the right noises, interjecting, interrupting, concurring, dissenting, assenting - all the interactions of life are there in place again. There is though, one thing missing: you dear man.
I want to tell you that the loss doesn't lessen, it takes its place in your psyche and reminds you now and again to think about the man who went before us and before his time.
In cliched style, I can tell you that there is not a day goes by when I don't think of you and all that you were and all that you gave us; and all that you took away.
And I doubt that will ever change.
Your death and you have changed me. I am not the same girl. I am not the same person. Difficult to articulate, let me tell you.
Sometimes I think I walk with a dead man.
Who isn't coming back.
Ever.
Somebody asked me how I feel now that you are gone; I guess anticipating that I must have accepted your demise by now.
The answer is simple - the same! You are still dead and we are still waiting, to see if in some way you will ever return to us.
It is true to say that the legacy you left is great and all encompassing. We talk about you often and think about you more so; all for one thing: - to fill the void, to bridge the gap, to circumvent the abyss.
As they all told us, things are easier, life is easier. The struggle for control has in some way diminished, because in the end, our own sense of survival has guided us to the point where we can function again, on a daily basis; making the right noises, interjecting, interrupting, concurring, dissenting, assenting - all the interactions of life are there in place again. There is though, one thing missing: you dear man.
I want to tell you that the loss doesn't lessen, it takes its place in your psyche and reminds you now and again to think about the man who went before us and before his time.
In cliched style, I can tell you that there is not a day goes by when I don't think of you and all that you were and all that you gave us; and all that you took away.
And I doubt that will ever change.
Your death and you have changed me. I am not the same girl. I am not the same person. Difficult to articulate, let me tell you.
Sometimes I think I walk with a dead man.
Who isn't coming back.
Ever.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
