11:06 a.m. - 09/26/03
grumpy grief.
I thought I was grumpy.
You've changed your mind?
Maybe. I don't feel so crabby now; I don't feel so set to bite. I just feel...like I imagine the rain does, falling onto the parking lot outside my window.
And how do you imagine the rain feels?
I'm not sure. I know that when I went to sleep last night and this same storm was so active, I thought about how wrong rain seems when it isn't onto trees. Rain is about the color it turns the grass, and the way it hangs on the leaves. I guess the rain seems out of place. Not even that, though. It seems to fall and have all of this energy, all of this emotion and need, that gets washed away by the city. By the people who are inconvienced and the trees that just aren't there.
Falling on empty ears, perhaps?
I guess. I know, my reward dependency right now is truly sky-high. I can't bring myself to do anything until I hear an accolade for something else. Other than sleeping and journaling and wasting time that is.
Wasting time?
Playing video games. Anything that involves staring at a screen is inherently wasteful.
Like television.
Yes.
And Internet.
Yes. It's an old reality. It's not the point right now.
What is?
The lack of trees. The fact that the rain falls down and finds only asphalt and more rain; sheets of water build in the parking lot because there's no soil to take it in. And when the thunder cries like a warrior it sets off car alarms.
It's not the right response. This has nothing to do with civilization versus the wild, with the city versus the country, but you're saying the rain is not receiving the response it needs.
Maybe.
Maybe?
Yes.
What response aren't you receiving?
I don't know. I'm lonely. I'm crying out, too, a lot, and there's no response.
Who isn't responding?
I don't know. I guess people generally respond to nourish and caged entries and they haven't been so much. Moreso, my dad's like a nervous ornament, hard to reach, hard to understand. Fragile and not real, not really here.
Your mom?
Looks like someone ran over her. I've regressed into hating her some. Hating her for not being ok. For being so tired and worn down and entirely pessimistic. I don't need that. I don't need her to do that again.
Again.
I don't need her to do that period. Not when I ... trusted her. I'm starting to trust her. And I make it sound like such a huge deal, like she's done some huge wrong, or she's doing one now, and she hasn't.
She wasn't there.
She's not here now.
So, who are you with? In your room between the two arts districts in the city?
My empty inbox and my Tori cds.
I'm sorry.
Don't be sorry. She'll come back. I really think she will. She doesn't mean to be so broken down, and Godd knows she has a right to it, considering. Especially considering the past few months.
All those things happened to you, too.
She lost her mother.
That doesn't negate your right to have one.
I want to go home.
Go. You know it's in you. You know you can find it.
My grandmother is dead. She's never going to hold me or tell me a story or yell at my mom to take care of me again. She's gone.
I'm so sorry. She's not gone.
It's not the same. And I haven't let her be here that way, yet. I keep waiting for her to be here like she used to be. It isn't real. That's why I won't write it down. I don't want to write it like it's real.
I understand. It's understandable. Take the time you need.
She's gone.
And your mom's gone for the moment, mentally. Your dad's gone. Your doctor was gone for three days, only three days - and they went quickly by, but he was still gone. Chas is doing something that sounds like "gone" to you. Every day that goes by with that beautiful thought of "these were the months I was there" makes you remember that soon will be the months you went to D!@#$%^, and when you left the IOP, when Harriet fell apart on you, when Tracy lost, when ...
Everyone doesn't leave. Everyone leaves. Everyone doesn't leave.
Two different memories. The memory of your past and the memory of your future. The memory of your first upbringing, your second, and that time afterward. That grief.
I want to go home.
You can. You have it inside. You have phone numbers and addresses and e-mail addresses. ...But you want them to seek you out.
Some do.
Others.
I don't pick up the phone and dial hoping they'll call me. It's pointless.
You'll call when you can. When you have regained enough ground to only need to talk with them, instead of needing them to be omnipresent. Constant. Psychic and always available.
I want to go home.
I must not know how to answer that. Or maybe you just need to say it. What can you do to go home?
Remember. Call. Call Sara, call Rogers. Call the non-Rogers Family members. Write Dixie. Write Katia. Make my room my own here.
Be who you are, who you were among them.
Yes. Tell the doctor all of this. It can be the subject we promised to talk about. I've been all upset that we planned to talk about Chas because I'm so upset about, oh, everyone else. But...it's all connected. It's all the same loss, abandonment, and need.
Very few of the people you're missing have abandoned you. Almost none. Know that.
I do.
Some of them are waiting for you to respond, aware that it may take you a little longer. Don't beat yourself up for not getting to it, but understand that some people are waiting on your response to speak again.
Ok. What do I tell the doc today?
Whatever you know. Whatever you feel and think and need or want to say.
Do you think he'll know the answers?
I hope he'll be able to offer you something. It may be as simple as knowing this makes sense, of having someone listen, of being there to touch your hand. He can do those things that not many in your life can do.
I want to go home. So I'll reach out my hand. I'll reach my memory out and see what it comes back with. I'll love as fiercely as I can-
And some days that means loss.
Grief. Good grief, grief of love. Good love. I want to go home into good love. And breathe there. Stay there. Rest.
All of this will be here when you've gathered your energy.
Right.
Mary...it's ok to be ambivalent. About how you feel. To love them and to hate them even just a little. To hate that they aren't being there for you. To understand all that your mom has to deal with and still be angry that she can't just take care of you. That she's making mistakes because of the state she's in. Whatever it is, just feel it.
It's going to be painful.
It's going to be finite. And it's going to be healing.
~chord & her counsel
