She Grieves

I am dangerously close to giving up. Desire is gone. Well, except for the things I don't seem to be able to have apparently. Food has lost its appeal, wine has too surprisingly, boredom has taken root, and the fetal position has become my best friend.

There was a time, and I don't think it was that long ago, that I loved life. I enjoyed food, looked forward to my weekends, walked around my skin with joy. These days, though, every task I do is one that I must force myself to complete. My diet has gone from gratefully cooking to what can I pop in the microwave.

I never thought I would be at this place in my life. I truly thought I would go on loving life until the day I died. How incredibly naive.

I had no idea that about months of accumlilated events would drive me to this place. Step by step, life just got harder to be in. I even moved halfway around the world to try to jump start things, and it did , for a little while. Living in a new country was exciting at first, and it took the crap a bit to find me. When it did find me, it really snuck up on me.

I am not saying it was all bad, no, there were parts that were fun, enjoyable, and hopeful even, exploring a new city. That is how it gets you. It lures you in. It throws some rose colored glasses on you. It makes you believe life is going to get better.

Those events I mentioned, they start far enough apart that you don't connect them. Some of them may even be out of your control. As time goes on, they start to come closer together until it seems like you can't wake up without something dark thought happening.

Then the self-reflection happens. The questions pop up. What can I do differently to create a different result? How can I make the best of this situation? What is the positive side to this?

It works for a little while. It does. Then, one day, you wake up, and take a look around you. And the only question you ask yourself, is how did I get here? Oh you can see the choices you made, and at the time, they were the ones that seemed the most likely to create an outcome you would like, yet you still cannot see HOW. You got. HERE.

Here is so far from where you would like to be. It feels like a locked box, no exit, huis clos. Sitting next to me are my demons. Those sneaky little thoughts that pick, pick, pick at your optimism until it is a rotting carcus, unrecognizable, laying in the dirt.

Each morning, I must get up. Slowly, I rise, feeling ancient.

It is a new day, I tell myself. Plently of chances to create something new for myself. But there is nothing to do. I try to read but my attention span is gone. I clean but my apartment is so small it takes no time at all. I walk around the neighborhood, stepping over garbage, moving out of the way of addicts as they amble down the sidewalk, half bent over, holding up their pants with one hand.

I start to think things could get worse, then I stop myself. No use inviting that into my life. I turn, and head home. Back the way I came, as clearly I did not put enough thought into my route choice.

People try to reach out to me. I Ignore them. What do I have to say anyway? No there is nothing new in my life. No I haven't gotten better. No I don't want to see anyone.

It has been a year since my husband died, and I have learned that grief is a tricky thing. Your view of everything gets distorted. The way you interact with the world is completely different.

And, after some time deemed acceptable by people who are not you, not living through it, the phone calls get shorter, the conversations change to superficial things, then they eventually stop reaching out.

You are left alone. I am left alone.

Then one day, a day that you never see coming, you wake up, and things just ARE different. The sun is a little bit brighter, the trees a little greener, the air a little fresher. You feel something you almost forgot the feeling of. You dare not name it lest it run away, to back from whence it came.

Then the next day comes, you tentatively look around you, and you think, yeah, maybe, just maybe, I can live my life again.

Note: I have been doing a bit of research on protagonists and antagonists, something I have never done before. So, in order to understand the character I would someday like to write about, I have written this. She has no name yet. All I know is that she grieves.