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| Evening walk last week. |
I'm alive and I live in paradise.
For more than a year I've been wrestling.
Swollen joints.(They went away; yesterday the swollen knees and ankles came back) A hoarse voice.
Grief.
Musing over Dan's central tenet. You're doing the best that you can. Really, you did the best that you could at the time. Really really, you did the best that you could at the time with what you knew at the time.
Really?
I am alive and I live in paradise.
My voice is unreliable. Is that the same as an unreliable narrator?
Why am I not working on a writing project right now?
Some days I can barely make myself understood. In places that I go regularly, people know to lean closer. Other days I clear my throat a million times. The phlegm lady.
Yes, I've been to doctors.
Hooray, I'll be on Medicare in November.
The lungs are the seat of grief, the acupuncturist says. Okay.
The Integrated Medicine doc says no dairy and gluten. Sometimes I cheat on the dairy.
What do you do with grief when you're grieving over a dead person while taking care of a dying person?
Wow, wasn't that like, a long time ago?
No.
I am alive and I live in paradise.
Paradise itself is struggling.
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| Starting in the lower right foreground, notice the white bumps, and follow them into the distance. These are the breasts of western grebes, poisoned by domoic acid. The Pacific loons, cormorants, and pelicans are darker and cannot be distinguished in the photograph. |
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| The beach, early morning, after the winds have subsided. |
6 comments:
I have had several episodes of that voice thing. It is definitely stress-related and in my case, it has arisen from my inability to say something I needed to say to someone and was unable to. It is frustrating and weird. I think it is a physical reflection of a throat blocked by unsaid words.
Oh, sweet Denise - I think I understand - the beach and grief I know well. Sending you love. Write. Just write.
Paradise struggling – I suspect many of us can relate to this, different circumstances
notwithstanding.
Have you had a scope? It might be a good idea.
Grief is something we carry with us for the rest of our lives I think.
Grief knocks us down to our knees. It takes a while to get back up again. You'll get there. "Someday," my friend Lana told me, "you'll feel safe again, and you'll finish your book." I didn't know what she meant. How did I not feel "safe"? I get it now. And she was right. And I did finish that book... and a few others. Hold tight, girl. We've got your back, and we love your voice (at least, the one you write with). Sending you all the love and energy of my ancestors.
Thinking of you, hoping all is well, even as you wrestle with the sadness. The sadness lives in us. It doesn't go away. But in time if we're lucky we go on. The luck comes and goes though. Hugs, hugs.
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