August was Rough Thank God for September!
There are times I really hate August. Memories. Loss. Birthdays, but death days, too. This is, to quote Jaxie: "About me." And how it is, right now. Self-indulgence, call it.
My father died on the cusp of August, between some time the last day of July and the first day of August in 1996. I remember going faintly insane. I'm glad my kids were small and don't recall that.
My niece has a birthday on the 1st. She just had her final treatment for cervical cancer. Praying God takes that tumor away completely. But call it August, right? She's doing really well. If you pray, pray for her. Her family needs her.
My sister-in-law has a birthday on the 3rd. But we don't talk. I haven't seen her in years. She's rather hidden herself and my brother (whom I love very, very much-but who can barely hear) away. P.O. Boxes instead of real addresses. I'm sure they live in the same apartment they have forever. But no one sees them. Maybe that's not true. Maybe it's just me they don't see. I dunno.
My mother was born on the 5th, but remembering her birthday reminds me she is gone (since '84). I write her letters. Now to both of them, Mom and Dad. It helps me, I think. I don't know if that's true. I think it does. If I only feel like it does, then doesn't it?
Our dog Cynder passed in August. Four years ago. So Facebook always reminds me with memories and pictures.
I'm reading Jax's journal and wishing she was still here and of course, I'm doing that in August because of all the other sads. I get so melancholy.
But, I can't. I can't afford to be sad. So much is going on in the lives of those I love, happy and sad. I need to get out of myself and be able to be there for them. I love them. I need to be in the now, to remember that they are still here and need me!
I often get over the sads quickly, but I need those sobbing cries. The hard stuff, the aching weeping that I sometimes do.
Honestly, December is almost as bad. Jax and Mom died the same day, so many years apart. But there are birthdays, too. My sister, my writing partner. People I love. And the anniversary of the birth of Christ is celebrated then. And I love that. I love the season.
I love fall, too. So I'm glad it's September now.
And we went to the shore on a family trip in August. Not this year, two years ago already. When the pandemic was becoming endemic stuff. And that was really good. Really needed it.
And right now, there's thunder in the distance. So I think I'm done rambling.