What a wallop I took when I went north to revisit my mom's house in April. Imagine the desolation of being inside the house you grew up in without the main components: the people who lived there, too. A house without its family is a very empty space.
Add to this the insult of seeing the house my parents cared about trashed by a freeloader who wouldn't go until I forced them, six months after mom's death, after they lived there against even her final wishes and broke her house rules entirely. Yeah.
Imagine the anger that consumed me due to the outright lack of respect for my mom. Toss in some lies about my personal character (generated by utter shit the freeloader said to anyone who would listen to their gossip.)
Pour in the unshakeable feeling of helplessness. Stick the pot on a stove til the unattended mixture comes to a boil. Check to see if burned. Call the recipe "I hate my family," then feel sorry for yourself, ostracize yourself from them (as much as possible) and drop away from working toward your private achievements for the next few months. Mope. Fuss. Cry. Hate. Flair up. Soothe yourself with boredom and neglect.
But, eventually, you're going to be twenty pounds heavier and the stuff you worked for will start to feel impossible to attain. And then you're going to come to the most uncomfortable conclusion ever: You're responsible for all your shit. Your mood, your life, your schedule, your body, your attitude, your home, your surroundings, your love. The single saving grace in the hell of realizing you are completely alone in the darkest of times is that it ends with a flourish.
I am a month and a day away from having to say, "My mother died last year." Every day that closes in on June 24th brings that pang of "she's not here" that cannot be conveyed to anyone who hasn't felt a loss of this magnitude.
I've had so many emotions and pity parties and bounce-backs and moments of determination - really been all over the spectrum of high highs and low lows - just trying to get back to good. I was doing SO good in just everything and my love for my family was strong, vibrant, unbreakable I thought.
Today I struggle to forgive. I wish to forget. Yet God made me one of those realistic honest-to-a-fault people who can't pretend everything is well when it isn't. I ache to let go of responsibility that doesn't belong to me - stuff I keep obsessing over like my mom's house and belongings and what's going to happen and why isn't anyone helping and how can I save it and on and on and on. I'm not responsible for any of it.
I'm barely responsible for -me- because I spend so much energy trying to be responsible for my mom, my cousins, my uncles, my not-siblings, the bank, the government... when I'm not supposed to be. The past few months have been a hard lesson in learning what really is for me to do:
Take care of myself.
Raise my daughter.
Honor my mom however I can.
Respect my family members.
Take care of my home.
Enjoy my life.
Be still.
I am happy to share that I'm coming out of the long funk with better focus and understanding. I am still sad. I still feel so much pain when I think of "home," but I've gained knowledge that I can only be grateful for and try to keep in mind from this time onward: I matter. I matter to me. Fuck. all. else.
