(no subject)
The first light of dawn has broken, turning the cool blue morning into a pale gray. I look in the mirror now and my eyes are red and wild with tears, my throat hot with a suppressed wail of grief. Now as I write this I can only think of how these words are already assuaging the tremendous anguish that a simple memory has brought on, and in a way I feel guilty about writing these words down and allowing them to stop the flow of tears.
I stood up for a moment to look at myself, again, in the mirror. These simple words have calmed my emotions making what few tears that have been shed feel extraordinarily anticlimactic. I feel like my propensity for sitting and writing on this journal has cheated me out of a much more visceral catharsis. I feel like I have stuffed something further deep inside myself with these words. I have robbed myself of an overlooked pleasure in life: crying. I terminated the natural course of grief, even grief that I thought to be long dead, with words.
But I might as well discuss what sent me into this sudden fit. I read The Great Gatsby; finished it just an hour or so ago. It was weighing heavily on my mind as I lay down in the blue dawn to sleep, but my thoughts fell on my father. Then something changed, suddenly, and I realized that I've spent a year grieving for one dead relative while leaving another one, one that quite possibly cared for me more than my father ever did (I can feel the tears somewhere, ready to well up again and if they come I will welcome them at this point). My grief for my great-grandfather, I think, was overshadowed by the unexpected death of my father, and not knowing him as well his life became a sort of legend in my mind. I think, at least in these few moments, that perhaps I never gave my great-grandfather his due grief. He still appears in my dreams, oftentimes alongside my father. Those are the hard ones, when I wake up out of some kind of half-sleep feeling lighter and emotionally drained. When these people appear in my dreams I think I cry in my sleep, waking up hours later feeling only the after effects.
The thought--the specific thought--that sent me into the short-lived fit of tears was the thought of my great-grandfather's gift to me. His legacy, above all other things he could have given me. It was simple gift, wrapped in a handkerchief, of the money that was in my great-grandmother's purse the day she died. A simple thing, more sentimental than monetary, and something that I'm sure I will pass down to my grandchildren some day as a reminder of their past. (Another fit of crying there, pulling back my hair and staring into the mirror as I did, watching my eyes and my face--I have a fascination with my face when I cry.) But there it is, the one thought that can send me into a fit of tears. An old handkerchief, twenty years old now, with a few dollars and a few coins. The last remnants of my great-grandfather, and now for me a telling example--the most telling example--of the man that my great-grandfather really was. That his collection of items was not truly because of his Depression era mentality, but really because of his vast sentimentality. This I have inherited from him, and it seems that it has passed over everyone else in my family. Or perhaps I am the one most susceptible to it. Perhaps it is just my youth, and everyone else around me has been hardened by their years. I don't know.
I'm not tired now and I odn't know when, exactly, I will go to bed at this point. Too many distant memories. The thoughts of faces and smiles. Rooms and smells (is it funny how I associate rooms with smells?). Things that are lost to the past but stored somewhere in memory, waiting for the right synapse to fire and then bringing them all back up to the forefront of thought. And with a look toward the past also a look toward the future. Always with an eye toward the future, streaming along every moment. Unpredictable in the long term, except for the certainity of our own mortality.
Morbid, yes, but all the thought of death seems to do that to someone, at least in the short term. If it weren't for the book this morning I doubt any of this would have surfaced, at least not now. But thoughts began connecting to thoughts and soon that singular, sad thought was upon me and sent me into the tears that sent me into this post that sent me into tears again.
For now I might try to lay down again. Crying has taken a lot of energy out of me and now that my body has eased out of it I am feeling exhausted. Sleep would be for the best, at this point, and I could manage seven or so hours before I would like to get up and actually have a day. I hate sleeping through the afternoons, but I would sleep until dusk if I let my body take total control over my sleeping schedule. And that would ruin most chances of being able to do anything useful. So I will try to sleep now. I don't know how much good it will do, but I'll give it the old college try.
Later.
I stood up for a moment to look at myself, again, in the mirror. These simple words have calmed my emotions making what few tears that have been shed feel extraordinarily anticlimactic. I feel like my propensity for sitting and writing on this journal has cheated me out of a much more visceral catharsis. I feel like I have stuffed something further deep inside myself with these words. I have robbed myself of an overlooked pleasure in life: crying. I terminated the natural course of grief, even grief that I thought to be long dead, with words.
But I might as well discuss what sent me into this sudden fit. I read The Great Gatsby; finished it just an hour or so ago. It was weighing heavily on my mind as I lay down in the blue dawn to sleep, but my thoughts fell on my father. Then something changed, suddenly, and I realized that I've spent a year grieving for one dead relative while leaving another one, one that quite possibly cared for me more than my father ever did (I can feel the tears somewhere, ready to well up again and if they come I will welcome them at this point). My grief for my great-grandfather, I think, was overshadowed by the unexpected death of my father, and not knowing him as well his life became a sort of legend in my mind. I think, at least in these few moments, that perhaps I never gave my great-grandfather his due grief. He still appears in my dreams, oftentimes alongside my father. Those are the hard ones, when I wake up out of some kind of half-sleep feeling lighter and emotionally drained. When these people appear in my dreams I think I cry in my sleep, waking up hours later feeling only the after effects.
The thought--the specific thought--that sent me into the short-lived fit of tears was the thought of my great-grandfather's gift to me. His legacy, above all other things he could have given me. It was simple gift, wrapped in a handkerchief, of the money that was in my great-grandmother's purse the day she died. A simple thing, more sentimental than monetary, and something that I'm sure I will pass down to my grandchildren some day as a reminder of their past. (Another fit of crying there, pulling back my hair and staring into the mirror as I did, watching my eyes and my face--I have a fascination with my face when I cry.) But there it is, the one thought that can send me into a fit of tears. An old handkerchief, twenty years old now, with a few dollars and a few coins. The last remnants of my great-grandfather, and now for me a telling example--the most telling example--of the man that my great-grandfather really was. That his collection of items was not truly because of his Depression era mentality, but really because of his vast sentimentality. This I have inherited from him, and it seems that it has passed over everyone else in my family. Or perhaps I am the one most susceptible to it. Perhaps it is just my youth, and everyone else around me has been hardened by their years. I don't know.
I'm not tired now and I odn't know when, exactly, I will go to bed at this point. Too many distant memories. The thoughts of faces and smiles. Rooms and smells (is it funny how I associate rooms with smells?). Things that are lost to the past but stored somewhere in memory, waiting for the right synapse to fire and then bringing them all back up to the forefront of thought. And with a look toward the past also a look toward the future. Always with an eye toward the future, streaming along every moment. Unpredictable in the long term, except for the certainity of our own mortality.
Morbid, yes, but all the thought of death seems to do that to someone, at least in the short term. If it weren't for the book this morning I doubt any of this would have surfaced, at least not now. But thoughts began connecting to thoughts and soon that singular, sad thought was upon me and sent me into the tears that sent me into this post that sent me into tears again.
For now I might try to lay down again. Crying has taken a lot of energy out of me and now that my body has eased out of it I am feeling exhausted. Sleep would be for the best, at this point, and I could manage seven or so hours before I would like to get up and actually have a day. I hate sleeping through the afternoons, but I would sleep until dusk if I let my body take total control over my sleeping schedule. And that would ruin most chances of being able to do anything useful. So I will try to sleep now. I don't know how much good it will do, but I'll give it the old college try.
Later.