Floating and seeing Da-ee...
I'm writing on a balcony overlooking a fountain in Rehoboth Beach. This time has felt so surreal; the last time we were here was in March 2017 before our world significantly changed. I wrote about massages and didn't know that would be the last time we went away without having to make preparations for my parents. That we would be down here with the only concern for cats versus care for elderly folks. That I would need to prepare medications and housekeeping. That I wouldn't then have a dead father and a mother who's ailing.
It's amazing how much time passes.
We came down Wednesday and I spent most of the time organizing and setting up planners for two days. I stopped writing in the end of August 2021, not fully setting up the new planner and needing to backdate a lot of information. When my OG supervisor for Volcano Harbor told me he was resigning amid all the other resignations, I couldn't quite process. Now I've been off since the 16th and will be going back on Tuesday- I truly have no idea what I'll be reporting back to.
0nn and her husband came down late Friday night. She and I stayed up until 0500 talking about any and everything. I tried to creep quietly into the too-small bed with Fidget only to have a massive shelf fall on my head at 0550. While we're fine and I was more scared, we didn't sleep too well after that, only to wake up too early to go to a float pod. I've never done the floating before.
I had two thoughts about the float pod- either I was going to think of my father the entire time or my brain would default to planning the next five years of my life. Naturally, Fate intervened and 0nn couldn't participate due to her hair being dyed. She returned an hour later to find me freshly showered and upright, and then I kept sobbing in my car as I told her of what I saw.
I saw Da-ee. I saw random memories of my childhood with no special significance. As soon as I got into the pod, my brain pulled up a memory of us in my aunt's pool when I was about nine, my father's big belly floating in the pool. My brain responded with see, you taught me how to float, Da-ee. And I languished in that Floridian memory of watching my father float from beneath the water. Slowly that memory drifted away from me, so I focused on my breath and not floating into the sides of this enclosed pod, beginning to quietly sob.
My chest started sweating, which immediately pulled up a memory of my father sitting sweaty with a cloth diaper tied around his head. We truly have the same chest and the same endocrine system. I kept crying in my pod, worried that I would alert the attendant I was having a "bad" experience. I changed the lights in the pod, switching to a darker blue. My brain pulled a memory of high school, Chess and I swimming in her illuminated pool one night. It quickly faded- maybe that's not what my brain wanted?
I decided to be brave and turn off the lights entirely. I kept breathing, feeling the disconnect that's so popular. My memory went back to around age 11 when we lived at the ocean. I could see the back of my father's head in his recliner, looking out over the ocean, telling me of the seagulls whom he had named "Admiral Halsey and the boys." I walked through our house before the renovation, the black tiles from where the carpet had been pulled. I went through the living room, seeing my father sweating and putting together the cabinets he would hang later. Another memory surfaced of getting ready for middle school, getting in Da-ee's truck, and him driving to drop me off.
The music came back on- I sobbed in my pod as I told my father goodbye and the memory of the ocean house drifted away. I emerged from my pod, fully desiccated, showering in a too hot shower to try to bring my brain back online. I treated the entire encounter as a gift, happy my brain pulled up random memories connected to the water and my father.
It's somewhat mind-boggling it's been three years. Three years since I got that call, three years since I made that decision, three years since my father died.
Between Marleycat dying and my father's three-year anniversary is my husband's birthday and our 11th (!!) anniversary. How much we've gone through and weathered. And now I incorporate my grief, share with my friend, go to a beach, and then play mini golf like a dutiful wife. The grief will come and go, my friends will share in it sometimes, and I'll continue to find solace in the sea.
I have a virtual interview on Monday with an organization my father used to support where I could do substance abuse counseling for firefighters. The opportunity is aptly timed and totally crazy. I wonder if this is where I need to go?
Right now, I'll focus on my last moments in this condo in Rehoboth before packing and needing to head west. Back to our life, our remaining cats, my mother and her grief. I'll figure out the last day of my much-needed time off work before figuring out what exactly is happening at Volcano Harbor with its mass exodus. But these are problems for Tuesday Jess...
... Sunday Jess will finish her coffee, relish the salt in her air, and thank the Universe for showing her her father floating.
It's amazing how much time passes.
We came down Wednesday and I spent most of the time organizing and setting up planners for two days. I stopped writing in the end of August 2021, not fully setting up the new planner and needing to backdate a lot of information. When my OG supervisor for Volcano Harbor told me he was resigning amid all the other resignations, I couldn't quite process. Now I've been off since the 16th and will be going back on Tuesday- I truly have no idea what I'll be reporting back to.
0nn and her husband came down late Friday night. She and I stayed up until 0500 talking about any and everything. I tried to creep quietly into the too-small bed with Fidget only to have a massive shelf fall on my head at 0550. While we're fine and I was more scared, we didn't sleep too well after that, only to wake up too early to go to a float pod. I've never done the floating before.
I had two thoughts about the float pod- either I was going to think of my father the entire time or my brain would default to planning the next five years of my life. Naturally, Fate intervened and 0nn couldn't participate due to her hair being dyed. She returned an hour later to find me freshly showered and upright, and then I kept sobbing in my car as I told her of what I saw.
I saw Da-ee. I saw random memories of my childhood with no special significance. As soon as I got into the pod, my brain pulled up a memory of us in my aunt's pool when I was about nine, my father's big belly floating in the pool. My brain responded with see, you taught me how to float, Da-ee. And I languished in that Floridian memory of watching my father float from beneath the water. Slowly that memory drifted away from me, so I focused on my breath and not floating into the sides of this enclosed pod, beginning to quietly sob.
My chest started sweating, which immediately pulled up a memory of my father sitting sweaty with a cloth diaper tied around his head. We truly have the same chest and the same endocrine system. I kept crying in my pod, worried that I would alert the attendant I was having a "bad" experience. I changed the lights in the pod, switching to a darker blue. My brain pulled a memory of high school, Chess and I swimming in her illuminated pool one night. It quickly faded- maybe that's not what my brain wanted?
I decided to be brave and turn off the lights entirely. I kept breathing, feeling the disconnect that's so popular. My memory went back to around age 11 when we lived at the ocean. I could see the back of my father's head in his recliner, looking out over the ocean, telling me of the seagulls whom he had named "Admiral Halsey and the boys." I walked through our house before the renovation, the black tiles from where the carpet had been pulled. I went through the living room, seeing my father sweating and putting together the cabinets he would hang later. Another memory surfaced of getting ready for middle school, getting in Da-ee's truck, and him driving to drop me off.
The music came back on- I sobbed in my pod as I told my father goodbye and the memory of the ocean house drifted away. I emerged from my pod, fully desiccated, showering in a too hot shower to try to bring my brain back online. I treated the entire encounter as a gift, happy my brain pulled up random memories connected to the water and my father.
It's somewhat mind-boggling it's been three years. Three years since I got that call, three years since I made that decision, three years since my father died.
Between Marleycat dying and my father's three-year anniversary is my husband's birthday and our 11th (!!) anniversary. How much we've gone through and weathered. And now I incorporate my grief, share with my friend, go to a beach, and then play mini golf like a dutiful wife. The grief will come and go, my friends will share in it sometimes, and I'll continue to find solace in the sea.
I have a virtual interview on Monday with an organization my father used to support where I could do substance abuse counseling for firefighters. The opportunity is aptly timed and totally crazy. I wonder if this is where I need to go?
Right now, I'll focus on my last moments in this condo in Rehoboth before packing and needing to head west. Back to our life, our remaining cats, my mother and her grief. I'll figure out the last day of my much-needed time off work before figuring out what exactly is happening at Volcano Harbor with its mass exodus. But these are problems for Tuesday Jess...
... Sunday Jess will finish her coffee, relish the salt in her air, and thank the Universe for showing her her father floating.