Sometimes nothing helps

Today it all hit me. All the losses of the past couple of months and the echos of those further back piled into me as if I'd braked too suddenly in traffic. I don't know why. I think it began coming on last night and today I just couldn't shake it. Even getting up early, going to the church rummage sale, third in line, and buying a great little kayak for $125 didn't break the flow of what's going on inside me. I tried thinking about places I'd go in the kayak. I looked online for a spray skirt for it. I took Shadow down to the Larry Scott trail by the water between the boatyard and the mill and we walked through a picture perfect blue sky day with soft lines of white clouds trimming the sky over the water. Nothing helped. I just plain feel sad.

I walked through my world today like some alien, invisible visitor. I've been missing mom, wishing I could call her. I've been missing my sons and tried calling each of them last night but both were in their cars and unable to talk. That's when something shook loose, I think, and the sorrow just overwhelmed me. A happy dog, pleasant people, beautiful surroundings - none of it mitigated the low that took hold of me.

The annual film festival is this weekend. Last year I raced around to 11 movies over the weekend and loved it. This year I haven't wanted to even go down and try to get into one film. I'd like to see a lot of them but I don't actually want to go now and be with people. I can't fathom focusing on it, acting like everything's okay. My heart is aching. And after helping to bury my dear friends' dog this week and being told there's no hope for my now oldest cat, Lucy, I am reminded that love means heartache, eventually, every time.

So how do we stay open? How do we keep loving and stay engaged in our lives, knowing that death and sorrow and partings will just keep coming, more often, the older we all get? Right this minute I'm picturing my mother, moments after her death, peaceful at last, with two of her friends, one seated on either side of her, looking straight ahead while each held one of her hands. My sister and I took in those lingering moments and promised remembrance. We and Mom's friends were honoring the transition of a life and we took it into our own lives one last time.

Remembering that moment does help me now. It's not like traffic. It's not like it all came to a screeching, unexpected halt and I was thrown from the car. True, some of these losses have been unexpected but many have not been. The price of loving is ultimately letting go but none of us are ready to do it most of the time.

I was not ready for my friends Carolyn and Loretta to die a few years ago. Or Bill Dunning's suicide. Or for the startling suicide of my neighbor Mike, who made sure I was there so he would not be alone when he pulled the trigger. Those were all traumatic endings. But Mom, my neighbors Ray and Marjorie, all were in their 80's and we can't any of us be shocked by their leaving. Still, death is a challenging thing to accept. We feel disloyal to the dead if we are ready or accepting of their death. And the longer we have someone to love the harder it is to let them go.

If I can rise up from the mourning, then lay back down into it as I need to, knowing I will get up again, maybe this very intense period of loss will teach me some grace and I'll get a little further down my own path towards acceptance and gratitude. I have so much to be grateful for, having had the chance to know and learn from and love so many people and lovely animal friends too.

Tomorrow a friend is taking me to Seattle to the art museum. We'll see Imogen Cunningham's photos and Andrew Wyeth's paintings. Maybe I'll fill myself up again and feel nourished. Maybe it will be a day when I reconnect, for a while at least.