I wake at 5:45
into his absence. Or at 6:30. Or at 7:12.
“You’re in shock,” we keep getting told. “You’re in shock.” I’m not sure I know what that means but one hint is how skewed time is — the calendar has almost no meaning.
What do you mean it’s less than three weeks till May 1? I thought it was a month and a half from now. When did I travel to Colorado? When did I get back? Wasn’t it like two months ago? Has it even been a month since he took his life?
No. Not even one month.
That’s in four days. THAT point in time is rock hard clear.
The number of times I can’t find my phone throughout any given day has easily doubled. Is this what they call grief fog?
At lunch, I cry. On the phone with BZ in the evening, I cry. After breakfast, writing three thank you notes, I cry. Talking to a neighbor on the curb about her father’s suicide, I cry. Lying down to sleep for the night, I cry.
I try not to think about that last day because it’s so traumatizing, but even to remember ordinary days with him in them, ordinary memories of a family of four, creates a different kind of agony.
Today I will drive 28 minutes north and talk to a book group about The Weight of Cloth. I’m bringing some indigo-dyed cloth. I’m bringing a pile of books that I consulted for research. I am bringing a determination to let the two hours serve as a healthy distraction.
I must end with gratitude. The cards, flowers, food and offers for food keep arriving. It’s astonishing, really. Thank you Kim. Thank you Risa and Kris, Pamela and Joel, Ellen. Thank you Barbara and Candy. Thank you Mark and Ruthann and Brenda. Thank you Diane. That’s just the last few days!
Note: at this point, people are apologizing for responding “late.” In this realm of communication, there is no “late.” A card with beautiful remembrances of Danny will be welcome any day from now until my last day and arriving on an otherwise quiet mail day turns out to be rather perfect timing.
I was up at 5:30 this morning also, thinking of you. And at 6:30 and 7:15. It was a morning of grieving for you all.
Those pajama bottoms! But more riveting are those sweet little-boy faces and Cary’s tender hand holding Danny close. There then, and surely now. Please let time jumble up, dear Dee. 💕
There should have been a note with the bundle of cloth when I resent it. I realized that cloth was wandering around in the postal system was when Danny made his move. I’m glad I didn’t send a knee-jerk reaction at the time. There is so much to consider. Your talk of the medium sent me on a quest. No Danny for me, but all I have ever gotten from the dead is a genuine sense of “be not afraid”.
I’ll look again. I didn’t see the note.
By now, you know there was no note.
I was awake at 5 too.
Yes got your message.
And yes, it was part of those last days, this package. One note I left tabletop for Danny said, if I’m not here I might be around front looking for a package.
I’m excited for you going out to talk about your book and the research that went into it. I’m also not at all surprised by the love surrounding you .. you are an awesome woman who I have no doubt has been on the giving end many times. Being on the receiving end is much much harder.
I just reread sections of my novel and came away both sad and energized. There’s a lot about death in there.
💙🕊️
🩷 hi Pam.
I hope the talk will be a very positive experience. That you have the strength and are willing to “connect” with others impresses me, though perhaps you feel any thing but strong. The pictures of the boys are beautiful.
The book group was absolutely wonderful. Great comments. Good questions. The time passed in a flash.
so good to hear the book group was wonderful!
So happy it went well …
Yes. And it was all Black women so I was especially interested in what they had to say.
In these days, time can just melt away. Does it really matter?
All the best with your talk. Maybe you will take some strength from it. I trust you will be surrounded by goodness and love.
Let it flow.
The calendar matters hardly at all, really.
So sad to hear about
I’m so pleased that the book group went so well.
The group talk, maybe not a distraction but a filter for just going.
You’re right to suggest it was so much more than a mere distraction. That was the grief talking.
❤️
Your boys, wearing their pajama bottoms made by your loving hand; their Dad, cuddling and reading to them- the loving movie reel of family.
Perhaps of all of the book talks you have given, this one to a group of black women, will stand out for here, simply, is validation,
From The Weight of Cloth: “Freedom for a black person was like a spider web waggling in the wind. One stray finger could tear it all down.” But it did not get torn down as Saffron, Melody and July lived their lives, rising above and standing tall.
It was so validating.
Thank you for taking the time to find a quote. Many of the comments made by the women started with reading a phrase or a passage from the book. I’m used to hearing praise about my language but it was new to hear praise for not valorizing any of the white characters and for capturing the inhumanity of the time.
This is significantly so validating of your novel, Dee. Wonderful!
Dee~ I’m so happy to read that the book talk went so well and that it was validating. I don’t see it (only) as a distraction…I see grief as ebbing and flowing, for one cannot stand in the waters (tears) of deep grief for an extended period…one needs to step back now and then – maybe to just waist high or maybe just dipping in your toes or sitting on the banks overlooking your grief…entering the grief pool as needed. It is just not humanly possible, not sustainable to stand in deep grief forever.
I look at these two little boys and their daddy and feel in my heart that one day, these captured moments will provide warm memories, apart from this moment. It takes time.
Love to your family.
There are many hours in a day when I am functioning and to an onlooker would appear normal.
It will really help me too to pick a writing project and really go with it. I’ve been dillydallying for a while now with ideas and not really taking a direction. Writing about things happening in 1801 can be absorbing in a good way.
Dee~ (((hugs)))
Know that I am here, even when words come slow. Whatever works for you will be good. I hope Cary and your husband are finding their way too. I think of them daily.
Speaking of which, today leaving a new park, we drove by Daniel Dr. Then I got home and saw the big crash on the Eisenhower Tunnel road and am grateful that you are home safe (not even knowing if that is the route you went, just a CO thing)…another video is titled ‘finding Daniel’ – I don’t click on it and don’t know who this Daniel is…I just feel the moment and sigh. xo
That pile up is something Danny and I would have texted back and forth about.