On Grief
In many ways, this space is a coping mechanism of sorts. While I may not go into any detail about what happens when we go to the pediatrician, or the strain of day-to-day life in balancing childcare with work while still remaining halfway sane, this collection of fart jokes and petty annoyances has had its purpose in allowing me to deal.
If you've been anywhere near this entry in my wife's blog, you know that reality took a nice big windup and left me a bit broken today. In typical form, I imploded at work, wanting to be somewhere else, most preferably out on the pier next to the building, in the driving rain.
Eventually, I slowly got the better of my emotions -- I'm still processing even now -- and am now damaged but alive. So are we all, I guess.
It might be a particularly American trait, and moreover a technologically-savvy American trait, of not only baring your innermost thoughts and feelings, but doing that to anyone who'll listen. I bring this up because for the most part this space has been for goofy shit -- like I said, fart jokes.
Now, I'm not so sure. I feel that there is still something that I might need to talk about -- but I haven't decided who it should be with. On the one hand, I'm getting an urge to write again, to process the avalanche of emotions I didn't think I would be required to understand and know, and therefore by doing that, whether through execrable poetry, fuzzy photography or both, fight this new pain in my life. Talking is curing, I suppose. That it may also be somewhat of a cry for help and sympathy, that other people might realize that I expected all this to be hard, but not this hard.
On the other hand, there is always the nagging doubt I have that my personal feelings are best dealt with on a personal level and nothing more. That this -- this outpouring of feeling, suffering, anger, hope -- has to end up being for my son's benefit and not my own. Now, mind you, I don't look down on the Divine Miss M in the least for baring her soul this way; it's just that I'm wondering whether my own grief should be publicly shared/tinged with slight narcissism/gaining support from our community of friends, or whether it should be more private, since I don't want anyone's pity and I don't want to hear the "I'm so sorry's" and "if you need anything's" right now, at least.
Simply speaking, I don't trust my confused mix of emotions enough right now to tell whether I want to talk about this or not in a public forum, with all 2 of you. That sounded needlessly hostile, but I think you get what I mean.
Needing sleep and a beer,
B