I stopped writing after the first year. At least regularly writing. At first the need to write was like an urgent, pressing need. There was just so much to process, so much to share, so much to express and I had to get it out before it all jumbled up into the next experience or feeling. Like train cars smashing and piling into the one before it. In the very beginning I felt like I could write 3 or 4 times a day. Gradually it slowed to one writing a day, every few days, once a week, and then really pushing myself to get something posted once a week. Gradually it felt like the immense train came to a rolling stop in one place, bellowing out exhausted black smoke, giving me time to step out and survey the strange, sad, desolate land of my arrival. You might be wondering what it was like, after the fire and the crisis. What does life, as we must call it, look like then? The best I can say is that it was foggy, slow, and tender. It was like rehab and recovery. Painful, necessary, full of st...
I don’t know why, but I have always felt calm in a crisis. When I was 16, I was in a terrible car accident. I was stopped at the bottom of a hill, waiting to make a left turn, when I happened to look in the rearview mirror and saw a car barreling toward me. I knew it was going to hit me. At that moment, everything slowed down. I noted the driver, turning and talking to the person beside her, oblivious. I thought through my options. Turn left? No, oncoming traffic. Move right to get out of the way? No, cars coming there, too. Speed up? No. I wouldn’t be able to accelerate fast enough, and then she would hit me and propel me even farther forward. My only option was to take the hit. I somehow had the presence of mind to take a deep breath and relax. I knew that the more tense and tight I was, the more injury I would sustain. So, I just relaxed my body, took a deep breath, pushed my foot down harder on the brake, made sure my steering wheel was straight, closed my eyes and waited. Bre...
First. Deep breath, my dear one. Your breathing is shallow and high, choked by the tightening in your throat, The black weight sitting on the top of your lungs. You must remember what living is like and this is the first step. Deep breath. Breathe, just once. Then do it again. Second. With a soft voice, I am going to tell you something terrible. Your child is finished with their human experience and you are not. Your child’s soul was lifted out and as it rose it grew and unfurled into myriad, unspeakable refracted colors and pure light. They rise, spinning, laughing, into the joyous embrace of the countless many, music vibrating around them and lifting them even higher, filled with knowing, and love, love, love, love. But, You are here. You are still here. Diminished and gasping for air. Sputtering. Arms empty. But, You are not alone.
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