I miss her. I miss the routine, my sense of purpose, my north star. I knew this would happen, that I would be lost for a while. It’s different knowing something will happen and feeling it when it finally does. You can’t predict what it will feel like with certainty. You can say, I’ll feel sad, or I’ll feel scared, but until it happens, you don’t feel anything and when it happens, you are like, wow, this is different than what I imagined, this is murkier and ickier and I want to go back to where I was, imagining how the feelings would feel but not actually feeling them.
I've started packing stuff into boxes I've stored in a locked basement cupboard for seventeen years. No reason to keep them locked up. No reason to keep them at all, really. When I moved here to the Love Shack in 2003, moving on was my normal M.O. I don't remember now but I'm guessing I didn't expect to live here long. Then life ensued. I got a job, I got a cat, I went to graduate school, I got laid off and fell into self-employment. I peaked around 2013, I think. After that, my normal sense of confusion began to reassert itself. Regressing to the mean, as it were.
Until Mom got dementia. What a strange blessing. Once again my life had meaning and purpose. She needed me, I needed her. Of course, we knew that couldn't last forever. But it could have. I was prepared for her to live to one hundred. As it happened, I spent five wonderful but terrible years spinning in a tightening orbit around her. Then the cat died, then Covid, and you know the rest. Bam. Slow motion train wreck.
It's good I'm leaving this apartment. It's hard to stay warm in the winter. The heaters in the main room and kitchen have been nonfunctional for several years. The landlord attempted to replace the thermostat and almost set the place on fire. The wall around the thermostat is still singed black, a reminder that electricity can keep you warm or it can burn your house down. A small space heater works pretty well for maintaining a livable temperature around my work table. (The bedroom has heat, thank god, or I would have dragged up a long time ago.) The bathroom has never had heat, and in the winter, the room is both cold and damp. I've been doing laundry by hand at night and hanging the wet things to drip over the tub. The colder it gets outside, the longer the things take to dry. Last week I made the mistake of handwashing a small load of kitchen towels. Not a good idea. After five days of hanging on the shower rod, they are still damp, and judging by the smell, they are now starting to molder. No wonder my nose is trying to kill me.
Circumstances seem to be shoving me out the door. I'm going with the flow, hence, the packing. At some point, we will receive ashes and death certificates. All the tasks will be done. All the possessions will be distributed. All I need is a map and the open road. I'm ready to be reborn into some warmer, drier life, even if it means becoming temporarily homeless. I'm finding, though, that even though I'm happily letting go of furniture, the detritus of seventeen years is rapidly filling up all my boxes. Do I let more things go? Or do I get more boxes? The answer will depend on what kind of vehicle I find and how much it can carry. It's simple, really, just a matter of cubic feet.
Packing gives my hands something to do while my mind rummages around in a fog of shock and confusion. I have a plan, but it's in the ether. I haven't assimilated my new situation so I can't see a path clear to my next situation. I'm running on autopilot, just doing the next thing in front of me.
Last week I left four bags of her clothes at a thrift store. I donated her furniture to a second-hand shop. Today I tossed her upper denture in the trash, ew, I know. So weird. It all feels surreal. I still can't believe she's gone. Three weeks ago, in five minutes I would be bundling up to walk out to my car and drive over to the care home, wondering how much longer will this go on? I always knew this moment would come, but now that it is here, I feel no sense of peace. I have an intention, and I'm taking action, but it's like I'm a character in a movie. What will she do next? Is this a tragedy or a comedy? Or (most likely) is it the apocalyptic story of the end of the world? Stay tuned for the next episode.
