good grief Old Future
good grief Old Future, up until you the losses I had were mostly from standing still watching what I wanted pass me by like travelers on a moving sidewalk at the airport headed for their next great adventure. Instead of going after anything, I just daydreamed about what could have been as I waited for my own life to take off.
good grief Old Future, life is like a perpetual game of tag and I have always been looking for the safe spot. First it was my room, then Tae Kwon Doe, then sex, drugs, and shifts at a call center. Meeting you was more than just the next relief point, it was finally forward momentum.
good grief Old Future, pulling off dangerous stunts doesn’t mean much when it feels like there’s nothing to lose. Opening the trunk of a car speeding down the highway didn’t compare to telling you I loved you for the first time or telling my sponsor I was an alcoholic. The healthiest things I’ve ever done in my life have always been the scariest.
good grief Old Future, life doesn’t unfold with pause buttons or places for bookmarks. We did the best with what we knew, but I now realize returning to a previous scene isn’t an option. There can be a whole new chapter, but we can’t go back.
good grief Old Future, this one decision led to the next led to the next led to us breaking up. Everything is different now and yet it’s all the same too. Even though I try to write, my words fail to capture any overwhelming emotion. Love, depression, grief all become unmoldable lumps of clay I keep reworking trying to describe things we can only feel.
good grief Old Future, sometimes I wonder if I missed my chance to be a Dad. I’m not saying I regret the path we took, I’m just saying maybe Robert Frost was right when he said, “way leads on to way and I doubted if I should ever come back.”
good grief Old Future, it’s hard not to see things divided into before and after. The things that pulled us together: poetry, passion, intellectual discussions weren’t the things that kept us together.
good grief Old Future, we kept taking next steps down the path to a future that we’d never have. Move in, become pet owners, go to counseling, get engaged. There was no dead end sign warning us of what lay ahead but we knew it was going to be rough terrain.
good grief Old Future, comfortable had become our default. When I asked you if you were happy and you said, “no,” I knew we couldn't be together. “I love you” also means I want you to be happy, even if it’s not with me.
good grief Old Future, it wasn’t just losing you, it was having to scrap the whole future I thought we would have together. Everything was happening out of order and we thought we could fix that without clearing the table.
good grief Old Future, I still talk to your parents even though I know they’ll never be my parents now too. Hearing them talk about the house they bought for you instead of us stung a bit, but I’ll take that over total silence.
good grief Old Future, the shift from “our” to “your” undoes each stitch that tied our lives together. I’ve been unraveling the thread for months.
good grief, Old Future, is recognizing Grief well enough to know I’m not always sure when she’s coming but whenever she arrives it’s time to pull out the crepes and tea.
good grief, Old Future, is circling on all the griefs like an underdog in a bar fight. Dealing with each “what if” and piece of our imagined future one by one keeps them from coming at me all at once and gives me the chance to stay on my feet.
good grief, Old Future, is realizing that all the grief, embarrassment, and heartache we’ve endured aren’t just scraps of experiences to be thrown away. They’re how we make compost out of trash heaps and gardens out of discomfort. They’re what we have to offer others to show something good can grow from this place.
good grief, Old Future, is staying busy and getting obsessed with tea once you were gone. Chamomile if I’m staying in to watch Les Mis. Hibiscus honey if I’m reading and writing and memorizing poetry.
good grief, Old Future, is accepting all the pleasant lies I told myself to get over you were necessary to keep going and not get stuck in one place. Lies: It’s fine, now I’ll get to live alone and decorate my place in the boho, bachelor, Harry Potter, bard theme I’ve always wanted. I’ll have a den of great exploration and experimentation. I’ll have more time for my art. Give up the lie: I have a comfortable canopy bed I drink tea in and cry watching the Truman Show.
good grief, Old Future, is sharing progress notes on how we’ve grown as partners, friends, and humans. Right place, right time, wrong circumstances.
good grief, Old Future, is doing exactly what you need to in each moment: scream, sob, tell someone how you feel. It’s the hardest, but it’s also the most important.
good grief, Old Future, is being able to tell the difference between not knowing and not accepting. One requires patience and exploration, the other dealing with what you’ve found.
good grief Old Future, grief is about getting naked in a hurricane, watching the waves come for me, and believing I won’t drown. It’s about realizing it doesn’t matter which way is up if I can learn to breathe underwater.
each good grief participant was given the opportunity to contribute something to the project
see below for this participant’s contribution
After the abortion.
I can’t help but read your mind.
I can’t help but let the pulse
Of your soul — mingle — with mine — to
Break, charge, dance — like subatomic cosmic! shock waves
Like a volt of numb through the marrow –
Tarot cards with numerals of additions of multiplications of sub — track — tons of foggy past mingle with misty future tangle to cloud present present present, equals to the minds, adds to the seconds of the times, times divide by the beat of our silence.
My life your life our life.
Palmistry for the limbless.
Crystal balls for the blind.
Scatter shots of presumption conception assumption.
I can read your mind.
But I don’t know the language of it.
I seek search find — don’t never won’t — a rune a guide a rosetta — stoned, blurred concept, no precept, no translation no transcript no talisman — to the language of your language.
I can’t read my mind, my language, to read your mind, your language.
Dear, sweet love, mine — echoed thoughts — yours, his, hers, ours — wordless signs — find, search, seek.
There is a something I want to say.
There is a something I must be saying.
Echoed thoughts. Wordless signs.
A tourist to your heart.
And to mine.