This week seems to be dragging. I’ve often been left feeling as though I am stuck in an expanse of time in which I am neither here nor there, lost at sea and left battling the wars from the inside, drowning in the thoughts that cannot be verbalized.
I’m starting to think that perhaps the first week back after vacation should be a shorter week. You know, slowly drag yourself back into the reality of working life rather than blindly jumping in without looking and slamming into sunken hazards sitting just below the surface.
I STILL haven’t received any responses to my email from my boss, but I did find out that the file I had requested to be removed from will be given away. Apparently, management has decided to divide it among two people. I’m happy it’s getting off my plate but a little bothered that all of a sudden they’ve decided that it’s too much work for one person when it seemed fine and dandy for me to do it by myself for so long. At least it’s gone from my plate though, so I don’t really care who does the work. Otherwise, work is work and I am slowly digging my way through everything else that needs to get done, but I still feel like I am too far behind and won’t ever catch up. The long weekend can’t come soon enough!!
Outside of work, things just feel blah.
Years ago, when my mother and her sisters decided to sell the little white house after my grandmother died, I told them I wanted to dig up a sugar maple from my grandparent’s yard before it was gone. So one day I went and dug up a tree about 8 feet high, put it gently in the back of the truck, drove it home and planted it. For just over 20 years that little sugar maple grew into a beautiful tree with bright orange leaves in the fall. It was beside our deck and sometimes as I passed it I would rub my hand along the bark. It always felt warm, even in the winter. In the early mornings when I’d first wake up I would find myself laying in bed, staring at it outside my bedroom window. It reminded me of my grandfather and it made me feel able to face the day ahead. Early in the summer I noticed that not longer after it had gotten a little bit warm, it lost all of it’s leaves. After staring at the empty branches for most of the summer I finally called someone to look at it. Unfortunately, it couldn’t be saved and yesterday we had no other choice but to cut it down.
It’s strange how the little things seem to carry so much power and have the ability to set you off course so quickly. I could go months at time without even thinking about my grandfather but every now and again something would hit me out of nowhere and I would be thrown back into that awful place of losing him. Since May it feels like all of the reminders I had of him are slowly being destroyed. First, the little white house was torn down and now the sugar maple has been cut and is gone. I know it is just a stupid house and just a silly tree, but my heart feels heavy. I worry that soon I won’t have anything left to remind me of him. I guess some things just can’t stay the same forever.
It’s the little things that seem to hurt the most these days. Like losing a tree. Missing my grandfather. Missing T.
I said I wouldn’t make my posts all about him, and I have no intention of doing so, but I miss T. A calendar reminder popped up on my desktop yesterday and it was a striking reminder of his absence. I felt bombarded with a wave of sadness and realized that beneath all of the hurt and anger that I just miss him. It is always a risk taking a chance on someone else but I’ve come to realize that he has been very much worth that risk. I wish it were easier to be okay with his absence. I wish I could just carry on normally while he is gone, but I can’t. I think everyone eventually finds someone who makes you feel at home in the world. First is was my grandfather. Then it was T.
I want to go home…
It Feels Complicated 