December 4, 2003 Not Washed Away

Don't get me wrong, grief sucks; it really does. Unfortunately, though, avoiding it robs us of life, of the now, of a sense of the living spirit. Maybe the hardest part of this will always be the unanswered questions. Questions I never asked when I had the chance because they never entered the realm of possibility anywhere in my consciousness. And if I don't acknowledge them once and for all, they are just going to seep into my dreams and I can't deal with that. So here I am! Acknowledging these questions, facing them, admitting them, so hopefully they won't haunt me. When did he start seeing her? Was she a factor? When did he start sleeping with her? When did he marry her? Where did they get married? Who married them? Who watched them get married? Where do they live? Why did they get married? What was so different about her or their situation that made him decide to marry her? What is it that she has that I lacked? Is she pregnant? Is he going to adopt her daughter? Does her daughter call him Dad? I was terribly erratic: feeling so holy and serene some moments that I was sure I was going to end up dating the Dalai Lama. Then the grief and craziness would hit again, and I would be in Broken Mind, back in the howl. How did he propose? Did he give her an engagement ring? Where did they buy wedding bands? What do his parents think? His sister? His friends? Do they think that he has gone stark raving mad? A fixation can keep you nicely defined and give you the illusion that your life has not fallen apart. But since your life may indeed have fallen apart, the illusion won't hold up forever, and if you are lucky and brave, you will be willing to bear disillusion. You begin to cry and writhe and yell and then to keep on crying; and then, finally, grief ends up giving you the two best things: softness and illumination. Why didn't I smash his toys and models and DVDs with a sledgehammer when I had the chance instead of packing them up so carefully? How could I have given him the benefit of the doubt for so long? Did he seriously promise to love, honor, and cherish her 'til death do they part? How? How could he do that? After all that we went through, after all of the marriage preparation we did both on a formal required level and on a private and personal level, every day in every happy and annoying and funny and ridiculous moment, after all that we promised, after everything we talked through and worked out and planned and dreamed? What is wrong with him? Is he mentally deranged? Did his heart plunge out of his chest and get replaced with someone else's? Has he fallen on his head? Has he fallen down and hit his head on something hard? Grief, as I read somewhere once, is a lazy Susan. One day it is heavy and underwater, and the next day it spins and stops at loud and rageful, and the next day at wounded keening, and the next day numbness, silence. I am going to have to accept that I will never know the answers to any of these questions. That they all go beyond any possible comprehension of mine and of the world at large. This is not normal behavior. I realize that the Scott I knew and loved lost his mind earlier this year, and I realize that back then he stepped so far out of the bounds of all that I believed to be true about him that this should come as no surprise -- but it does. I was blown away when he first told me he was having doubts. I was blown away some more when he told me he wasn't ready to get married. I was blown away some more when it was ultimately over. I was blown away some more when I first learned of her. I was blown away some more when I first learned they might be married. After each of these instances, I thought I could never possibly be more astonished. But behold! Unto me a shock is born. Here I am, being blown away again. I am blown away so far past all reason into utter fathomlessness by the fact that they actually are married that I almost feel like I have been hurled backwards with a cannonball force into some bizarro universe where all that seems impossible is true. And somehow, somehow I need to continue to find the grace to stand what I can never possibly understand. The depth of feeling continued to surprise and threaten me, but each time it hit again and I bore it, like a nicotine craving, I would discover that it hadn't washed me away. get notified. journal archives © Copyright 2003 elb

All quotes in italics are taken from Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott, who makes the world a better place.