losing connection

Eventually, I will have to move on and forward. I don't want to have as difficult of a time dealing with my new reality as I do. I want to accept it, for I know there is nothing else I can do. Reality won't change. The only thing I can control is the way I deal with it. That is, of course, not entirely true (because I can't help how I feel) but - at least - that is something I can try to adjust. I believe, that even though my behavior modification attempts are only accomplishing incremental changes, they must amount to a real, tangible change at one point.

In the meantime, I don't sleep anymore.
This restlessness is something I remember from the nights when J would disappear, drawn into the dark by his addiction. When he didn't come home, I barely slept. Is it that he isn't here anymore and that's why I can't sleep?? If that's the case then I need to find a way to _imagine_ him in the house or, better yet, sleeping next to me. In fact, when I tried this suspension of reality for a moment, I felt an instant relaxation. It was so overwhelming that it scared me. That can't be it! I told myself. Really?? How am I going to keep this up? I can't really keep that image alive for more than a minute or so. But, maybe I'll get better with time. Or maybe I need to find other ways to find rest.
Anyway, last night I gave up around 5 a.m. and decided to get back up and do my laundry. I finally went to sleep at almost 9 a.m. ... just for a few hours but at least something.

***

Even though I continue to get subtle signs of J's presence ...or some comforting divinely assigned presence (or whatever it is), I feel like I'm losing him. Or more accurately put: I feel like I'm losing my connection with that other dimension and with my inner self. Grief had torn me open in such a way that I became extremely receptive and sensitive to this other world around me, while the normal world (the reality I had been living in every day) appeared as if it had been submerged in a foggy haze.

I read this story about a woman who lost her lover and who couldn't find a way out of her pain.

"Another time she told me that she felt she had swallowed her own energy, and when I gave her paper and crayons asking her to draw this, she drew a picture of a snake which had swallowed its tail. The evening after this session I found myself thinking of this image again and again. I felt somehow that it was a Rosetta stone, the key to her whole situation, but I did not know how this might be. Furthermore, the image seemed familiar to me but I could not remember where I had seen it before. Puzzled I went to one of Joseph Campbell's books and found that this was the Uroboros, a symbol associated with first chakra energy, the energy of survival. I began to wonder if in a time of loss we may instinctively reinvest our energy back into ourselves until we are certain that we can survive our wounds. Could we possibly become so totally focused on sustaining ourselves that we lose the impulse to move forward and connect to the world around us?"
    [Kitchen Table Wisdom - Stories That Heal by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. -- p. 196]


Yes, Dr. Remen. That is exactly it. What a perfect story to illustrate how I feel, except for the fact that I am desperately motivated to accept these cards I've been dealt. This is life. There are times it's just a real freaggin' shlep. And at the moment the whole accept & heal task I've put on myself feels like a very Sisyphean task.

God help me.
But, also -- I thank God for all the good I have in my life. Two wonderful healthy children, my health, a roof over my head, not living in a war zone.... [these are my usual first gratitude points]. And I always pray for others. I know my pain is nothing in comparison to the suffering in this world. Alas, it still hurts like #%$@. :/

other layers of life

I don't dream of J very often. And when I do, it is usually a very brief and relatively somber appearance.
But the night his little girl arrived in New York City he was in my dreams all night. He was everywhere - in every strange unrelated new scene of my dreams - and in each vision he just seemed so happy.

His mother Thea told me that when his daughter was sleeping over, she felt her son's presence in the house strongly, and that the lights began flickering again. In her half-sleep, dozing off with her grand-daughter late at night, she vaguely felt a depression on the edge of the bed. As if someone had sat down beside them.

****

The realization of how much I miss him comes to me often unexpectedly.
What I have noticed is a pattern: whenever this sudden sadness takes hold of my heart, I get a subtle but clear sign that he (or his soul, essence, energy, I-don't-know-what) is with me. I'm not sure if it's him giving the sign or some other divinely assigned post (or maybe there is some sort of automatic divine algorithm to it) but either way -- to me -- they are so clear that it often takes me from tears to a smile. Even when I'm not crying and the awareness of his absence suddenly overwhelms me, it's hard to ignore these little "gestures" (or, memory triggers, if you will).

My postmortem entries are full of stories about this.

Most recent one -- yesterday:
As I was sitting on my computer listening to Spotify a song came on that, for some reason (chorus?), really gets to me (video link below).
To hide my the tears from my children, I moved to the window and as I was standing there - my hand resting on J's ashes on the sill, the strong breeze drying my tears - my gaze fell onto a man walking by across the street. He was dressed in a very similar way J used to dress (mostly due to the fact that almost all his clothes came from shelter donation rooms): Everything was a little too big on him and he would have to constantly pull up his pants. The guy down on the street also held his cigarette the same way, had a similar physique and hair cut, and walked almost identically to the way J used to stride.
It made me smile because for a full few breaths could I let myself imagine that this was him down there...and he had just gone out to smoke a cigarette and walk a few feet just as he always used to.



Sometimes, when I'm particularly desperate to stop crying, despite these comforting signals of his presence (or a dimension of life that I may not be able to grasp, yet), I am reminded of one of the first instances of this communication - a succession of small signs that ended with an encouragement to pray.
And then I pray.

***
Last night I went out to Times Square and the busy bright midnight summer scene reminded me of how J and I sometimes came to TS or down to the Village to walk around in the middle of the night, enjoying the vibrant pulse of this city.

I miss you, I thought, soo much - when suddenly - I hear a succession of a few long jazzy notes played on a saxophone that instantly reminded me of a video I shot a few years ago of J walking down Bleecker Street. In the recording, despite the late hour (1:30 a.m.), the street is full with people and as we turn the corner there is a Barry White Doppelgaenger, playing that same succession of notes auditorily mirroring what I'm hearing at this moment at Times Square.
(Please note: I'm not actually sure what Barry White looks like exactly. I just know he is black, probably over 45, and usually decorated with a full beard. If I were more motivated, I could venture out to google him now...but I'm not.)

Anyway, as I pass by a man with his head lowered, wearing a Yankees baseball cap - just as J often did - I try to locate the saxophone player only to realize that it is the exact same guy I recorded years back _AND HE IS EVEN WEARING THE EXACT SAME SHIRT and sunglasses as in my video. It feels as if I'm looking at a tiny snippet of my footage transposed into a different background set.

Anyway ... it is almost 5 o'clock in the morning now.
This insomnia isn't getting any better....