I am sitting here, staring at the screen, feeling dead inside, emotionally drained. It was good to get some things done today--dad's taxes are in, our taxes are in, and I finally worked up the nerve to call one of the 401k case managers and admitted I could not find any of the documentation needed to submit for survivor benefits. At a different point in my life, I would have scoured heaven and earth, piling and unpiling, viciously tearing through stuff to find what I needed. Life and death, you see. How things change when death is actually involved. I simply gave up looking, and then avoided making the phone call. You might be curious now about the documents for which I was looking. Passport. Birth Certificate. Social Security Card. Yup. Missing. All of them. Into some horrific vacuum. Proof of Who I Am. Missing. How appropriate.
The man to whom I spoke was very kind, and provided me alternate methods of proving who I am; I stumbled through my appreciation and sat down in the kitchen, numbly staring at the television. Brokeback Mountain was on. Good choice, Verrilli. :o/ The shower beckoned, and my kitties, Sid and Joy-Joy playfully trotted into the bathroom ahead of me. They know the peace of running water. They even like it.
Today I literally curled up into a fetal position on my bed, paralyzed by the emptiness gnawing away inside me. I don't know how long I was like that, in the quiet, the void space. After a while, my brain kickstarted, as if jumped by another's energy. Put on pants; now shirt; socks, shoes. Get up and go downstairs. You have errands to accomplish. Go. I am not going to say it was my father's voice, or a divine one. I think it was my own, reminding myself to take baby steps whenever possible. They were small, all right, but they got me out of the house to do what was necessary.
Back to this idea of the shipwrecked identity of a person who has lost a parent. Both parents. Losing them has eviscerated me. My life is now clearly divided in two: before and after. Part of my "before" identity included elements that were in place to please my parents, especially my father. I admired him, I feared his disapproval, I feared I'd disappoint him. I now have to examine which behaviors and conceptions were created for this purpose, and see if they serve me now. As a kid, I had to live with a lid on; I was flamboyant even as a little one. That flashiness disturbed my parents. Once I went away to conservatory being flamboyant served me well in class, and especially on stage. Coming home from school, I put the lid back on. When I brought my then-boyfriend, Karl (now my husband of 20 years) home to meet my parents, I tried to cap his natural ebullience so that he was appropriately presentable. I loved my parents, but they stifled part of who I was and I accepted it. As an adult I got very good at adopting a persona during visits, on the phone, so they would see Dr. Verrilli instead of Catherine. I believed that's who they wanted to know. I'll never be sure if it was true, but this has to be part of the letting go. What did I hold back from them that they might have really loved? I have to examine that in more detail, and perhaps invite some things back. At the end of my dad's life, I was too...present... to keep up any facade. I thank the gods for that. It leaves me, though, in a place of wandering...
A good friend told me that the death of his parents changed him, too, but served to validate who he was, and gave him more confidence because he was "on his own." Is that just a guy thing, or a healthy human thing? I am neither, I fear.
Today I am stumbling around, disoriented, like someone who's survived a shipwreck. I can't shake the feeling that my dad would be disappointed. I also can't shake the reality that I am suffering today, even with the sun out, and the flowers blooming. My gratitude journal has sat empty for two days. < sigh >
Thing is, part of me can stop whining, stop whinging at every little effort. I just don't know which part! I am dragging my heart around with me, and I would like to leave it home for a bit. This will not work, however. About a year ago, I made a commitment to open my heart, through breathing, yoga, therapy, and removing elements of self-medication. It was an important decision that has changed me. I think about all the things and people that have come into my life since then, and I'm grateful. THERE. I've talked myself into my gratitude entry for today.
It's okay. I'll be okay. Just not today.
About Me
- Catherine
- In this blog I have created a haven, a place I allow my deepest emotions to go and sit. I can write easily about what I’ve accomplished. This biography I can recite in my sleep. But I’ve always written poetry and in diaries since I was a teenager. I continued to write poetry in my journals, and not until 2006 did I show them to anyone. I generally write every day, at the present in memoir form. I haven’t written poetry since my mother died in January, 2007. I didn’t write at all between her death and the death of my father three years later in January, 2010. On my father’s birthday in March, 2010, I began this blog, to honor my father and to help me grieve. But I also desperately needed to write, and this stream of conscious style emerged. I needed to find my organic voice.
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