Silent language

I react to grief as I react to most stressors: weariness. I am tired down to the bone. But that's not all. My anger is there, hovering, seeking a handy target no matter how disconnected from the true source: that our world is forever changed, that my mother is left alone, that life is unfair.

And I cry. I cried over oil and vinegar salad dressing in the Microsoft cafeteria. I cried over spaghetti, and the thought of a phone call I have yet to make. I cried over a grave, not empty and yet so empty of what I hoped to find there.

I'm restless. I walk and walk and walk and still can't be still.

Returning to work brought some solace in the form of distraction. Busy, busy, busy.

Being busy makes me angry. I am pissed off about how busy I am. Busy doing nothing that matters. Busy because it's easier.

Being still makes me cry.

It's two weeks tomorrow. An eyeblink. An eternity.

I want to go home. I want to go back. I want things to be as they were but better: no pain, no cancer lurking in the wings, just ordinary, boring life, with no threats or vulnerabilities that can't be ignored no matter how hard we try. I want the luxury of complacency.

There's no going back. There's only figuring out what comes next. How we do this, how we go on without him. Who we are now, as individuals and as a family.

It is knowledge I would rather not have.