dreary day, dreary heart

i wish so dearly that this blog could be filled with flowers, hearts, rainbows and fluffy things that smell good but it's not. i've been emotionally going through a rough journey for a while and manage to deal with the things that plague me most of the time but yesterday i had an unfortunate resurgence of those sad feelings. i'm going to back track a few years.

march 2006. my mother had not flown in 10 years and i had convinced her to fly to phoenix arizona to visit my younger sister who had just moved there for school. we had a nice time traveling there and a good first day on the trip. later that evening at my sister's apt, my mom kept trying to contact my dad on his cell phone. she had forgotten that he was attending a 50th bday party for an old classmate of his. finally, her phone rang back and my dad was on the other line. immediately, the color fell from her face and she started screaming and crying. at this suprise b-day party, the woman who was responsible for my parents being together and who would have been mine and my sister's caregiver if something had happened to our parents had collapsed at the party and died after having a massive heart attack. her husband was there, my dad was there and all of the people that they had grown up with. her husband is a fire fighter and immediately went into rescue mode to try and save her but could do nothing. i'm fighting back tears right now remembering my dad telling me this story and him not being able to fight his. this was my mother's best friend, a woman i've known my entire life, a woman who was a character and a half and someone who is terribly, terribly missed. after decided to stay with my sister for a few more days so at least we all could be together while my dad helped their family, my mom and i flew home to immediately drive to the church to attend a funeral. the whole chain of events still makes me sick to relive, even two years later. while we were in arizona, i never had a moment alone to deal with this. i was either with my mom, with my sister or with both of them. i believe we were meant to be there when this tragedy occured. i don't think my mom could have handled it here, i don't think my sister would have coped well alone and well, i'm not sure about myself. i believe i was there to be the rock for both of them. so i returned, attended the funeral and never dealt with her death appropriately.

may 2006. our dog we had had since i was in middle school passed away. now, some of you may not be animal people but myself and my family consider animals to be a part of our family. this grouchy, overweight little crank of a dog was family and had been sick for a long time. she passed on her own, fortunately, and has never ever been forgotten. i helped my dad bury her in the backyard that day after watching him hold her in his arms and sob. it still breaks my heart. i try and remember the good memories with her and we still joke about her stinky farts and attacking the birds but i'll always have that sad day stuck with me.

july 2006. i met the man i married. the weekend following that, my granny passed away in a nursing home with my mom by her side after ten years of slowly dying of emphysema. we flew my sister home and buried her a few days later. my granny was the most awesome woman. her 'i don't give a sh*t about what anybody else thinks' attitude was something i've always admired. i miss her more than i let on. she was one of the few in my family that i truly felt i could tell anything to. i heard a woman a while back walking past and starting coughing as my granny had for so many years. it was so bittersweet. i miss that cough but that cough is what took her away so early. my papa is one of the most tenderhearted men i have EVER encounted. just as we all are, he is still grieving so much. in his little house, all he had left of his wife, my granny, was her devil cat, peaches.

fast forward. lots. after the barrage of death, i went into therapy but quit too early i believe. i got caught up in the middle of love - something i'd never truly experienced. i began cohabitation and within a year and a half, was married to a gem of a man. six months after falling in love with him, his mother unexpectedly passed away a story i can't emotionally afford to dredge up today. again, i became a rock and never dealt. and i'm now in a position where these unresolved feelings of grievance and saddness are coming back to haunt me. esp since yesterday.

yesterday morning at work my mom's cell phone rang and the screen read 'daddy'. now, she calls her dad daddy (i call him papa) and i call my daddy (her husband) daddy so i wasn't quite sure which daddy was calling but i answered since she was in the back of the office. it was my papa and i could barely understand what he was saying he was crying so much. i asked if everything was ok and he just replied 'no' and cried harder. i was so frightened and saddened to hear him crying like he was. it broke my heart into a million pieces just hearing him like that. turns out, the reason for his outburst of heartache was that he had to put down peaches, the one thing still linking him to granny. papa is more of an animal lover than anyone i know combined. he is now alone in his house. truly alone. it makes me so sad. and it has made us all relive losing granny and now that one (even if it was demonic) connection left to her is gone.

last night i had a terrible, terrible dream. all i really remember was that one set of my grandparents was renewing wedding vows (each set has one deceased partner in real life) so there was much commotion and excitement in the air. i then was informed that in three separate instances that day, my mom, my husband and someone else (whom i remembered in the dream and was very upset about but can't recall who now) had all died in car accidents. the day was so important though that there was no time for worrying about the deaths or feelings and we had to brush that aside to finish preparing for the day's events. towards the end of the dream, i was walking towards a door and came upon my granny and my papa sitting in a couple of chairs. granny saw my pained face and i went to her and we had a very long, and very needed embrace. i smelt her. i felt her. she wasn't sick. there was no oxygen tank. she looked healthy. she felt healthy. and she was alive. i woke up shortly after.

my life is wonderful. i'm happily married, have a masters degree now (!), teach at a wonderful place, have lovely animals, work with my family, am successful in my mind with my creations but deep down i'm sad and depressed. i'm sad because life changed for me in the blink of an eye. i lost very important figures in my life quickly together, i live a partnered life now thus my one-on-one relationships seem to have suffered and i often feel like i rarely make the right decisions in regards to friendships which are wildly important to me. why am i whining so much today? because i can. because i don't feel like i have many that i can do this to face to face. everyone is busy with their own lives, they don't have time to listen to old stories that i can't get over. i'm sure some select few would take the time but they've heard it all before. i need to get it all out without verbal interruption, without someone nodding and sympathizing - i just need to say it to me. the weather is crap so perhaps that also has something to do with this onset of saddness. whatever it is, i'm ready for the seasons to change, for my heart to heal and for life to show me the good and happy that will outweigh the bad and sad.