6 - a year in review, a greeting, another goodbye
year 6, letter 2, 3:09 AM
13 March 2015
It’s been another year since you left us. A lot has changed, a lot has stayed the same.
I’m sure you’d be proud to know that I can drive by myself now. I got my license last month. It was a close call, and I still feel like I need to wear a helmet when I drive. But really, driving is like breathing for me. It’s not that difficult and I like being in the car. I like listening to music really loud. I think that’s my favorite part. I get overly concerned about gas usage.
We have a dog now. He is a happy corgi puppy that is 11 months old in 4 days. He shares the same birthday as me. His name is Sabo and he is wonderful. He is so full of energy and life, but it’s sometimes a bit too much for the rest of us to handle. He is sable, which is a copper mixed with a brown, and has a little white marking on his head, and little white paws, and a very white belly. He loves showing us his belly. He shares the same birthday as me.
In just one year, I have fallen down, and I have gotten up, and right now I think I’m tripping. I need to right myself. Every year around this time I get a little down. I’m not sure why. I think of you more in the spring, likely because its when you left, but also likely because its a defrosting and everything sort of rushes at once. School and life catch me in a whirl around this time, but if I tough it through to about May, I’ll be fine. I’ll tough it out. It’s what you taught me to do. I wasn’t so good at it, and I’m still not good at it, but I think I have to learn.
To be honest, it hasn’t been easy. I wish I could say when I think of you, I’m filled with warmth. But I’m not. When I think of you, I feel empty. “The memories fade, like looking through a fogged mirror”. I am looking through a fogged mirror. I miss you and I miss being a little kid and I miss all of that, but most of all I miss not remembering. I feel the memory but I don’t remember the memory. It’s like a ghost. I can’t see it, but I can sense that it was there once, that it happened, and that I am missing it. I feel lost. I wanted to drive you in a car, I wanted you to teach me to drive, I wanted you to play and love our puppy, I wanted you to be there, be there always. Then, now, in the future. I still think that you will not walk me down the aisle, hold my kids, hold me, hold me, hold me. And this stupid simple truth hurts.
Right now I want to hold on to you as tightly as I can. I will not let myself forget you. I am slipping. I don’t know if that’s recovery or if that’s life or if my memory is already turning sour. If it’s recovery, I will not let myself recover. It hurts too much. I don’t think of you every day anymore. I only think of you when I hurt, when I feel empty. When my mind drifts, it will occasionally drift to you, but it isn’t the only destination anymore. Even that hurts. You don’t matter any less to me, but maybe you do. Maybe we’re all built to move on, to cycle through things. And that’s the worst part, and what hurts the most. If that’s a truth, it’s a truth I cannot accept no matter how true it is. Again, that hurts too much.
And the worst part is, I can see you now, crying and shaking, because you were that kind of emotional person. I miss you so much.
I love you.