Friday, October 27, 2017

Cold



I am not used to the cold anymore. I never have been a cold weather person. The sting of it on my hands this morning made me ache inside for the island I lived on a year ago. Grief shows up in moments unexpectedly. The cold and the grief, an ache and a sting. These things live in the body.

I try to escape feeling. This is one of my things. I am an addict. I find many ways to numb out. I fool myself into thinking I am not an addict. I can't escape myself though.

Being an addict is not the worst thing to be.

I have been taking pictures out in the woods of things that reflect my grief and loneliness back to me. Autumn gets me and where I am right now. Layers of fallen leaves in water, a dried husk of a blossom, mossy decay on a fallen tree.

I think about death a lot, many times during a day. I wonder if this is a rarity, or if we just don't share this, because it is taboo, scary, uncomfortable, forbidden ground. I am ok either way.

Sometimes I wish I was dead, but I love my family so much. They save my life.

I remember being a little girl sent out to play in the snow. I mostly just stood there and told myself, "You will get to go back inside soon." Waiting for the end, relishing the relief from the harsh cold.

When I was a little girl, about 5 years old, I was at my friend's house, her mom was my babysitter. She had a black lab puppy. We went to take it outside and it got away from us. It ran into the street and was hit by a truck. It was completely disemboweled. I remember its body in a snowbank, the blood leeching out turning the snow pink then red, the guts spilled outside its body, its tongue hanging from its mouth. Her father stood over the puppy with a stick, shaking it, and yelling "What did you do?". I remember the images, the words, but I don't remember what I felt, except that it was so cold standing there. I don't remember crying, though I must have. Death put its hand on me that day, out in bright sun shining on a bloody snowbank.

I need to go running, it is vital, a medicine...but I know it is still cold out there, so I am stalling. Avoiding. I will go though, as easy as it would be not to. I do possess strong will, and an undeniable perseverance to take care of myself so I can go on with this messy and magnificent life.

The things we do to keep going. The ways we survive. That is some awe inspiring shit.

I need to backtrack to something I said yesterday. I said I leave people. That is mostly bullshit. I have not left anyone in recent history, quite a few have left me. I hold boundaries, yes, but I am loyal to a fault and forgiving as hell. I don't leave people unless they have shoved me out the door and slammed it in my face.

I do have a tendency to make myself wrong even when that is not accurate. I put myself down, I take the blame. I often do not deserve it. Just setting myself and the record straight, because it matters.






2 comments:

  1. I read this tonight before I go to sleep. Are you in my head? I am an addict, I love to numb out, but I am strong and push ahead anyways.

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