Busy avoiding

 Last night I had a small realization that turned into a big one. 

I have been, like the rest of my family, busy avoiding the truth. My mom is gone. There are no more hugs left, no more smiles, her future is gone and with it the future the rest of us had with her. It seems so mundane to say it when we all know that is the case, but read it slowly and take each word in for the weight it carries. 

My mom is gone. 

There are no more hugs left from her. 

No more smiles 

Her future is gone. 

And with it, the future the rest of us had with her. 

It is one of those activities that you would see a 5-year-old just barrel through without a thought but this is something that needs attention, needs time, and needs patience. My mom's voice is gone, no longer to be heard. I have all of these recordings of her, all of these pictures and yet, there are no more. There is a finite amount of these things now. 

I broke a necklace of my mother's. Rather than large theatrics, I froze. I stood there staring at the necklace in disbelief. I took the time to realize that there are a finite amount of things that were hers. All of them, disappear and dissipate. The ownership is no longer a thing because those things don't belong to someone who is here and yet we imbue them with her, she chose this, she wore that... this was special to her. Like God, she is everywhere and nowhere at once. I remember in school I did a course with Barb Marshall on the Sociology of the body. It was one of the best courses I have ever taken. It was thought-provoking and challenged the notions of personhood against this vessel we inhabit. I say inhabit because we only inhabit it for a short time. We can change the construct of the body, and personalize it, and yet that body imbues who we are. Even when it fails us, even when it changes to be different, we adopt the roles our body goes through... and when someone dies, we separate role from the vessel. We tell each other that she is not in there anymore, we disassociate who she was from the vessel that just failed her... not failed, but finished. We avoid the harsh truth and reality by disassociation and avoidance. I am no stranger to this understanding, after all, I did get an A in the course, but the shocking truth is that I didn't realize up until this point that I was following that very model. I was not necessarily following Kubler ross (not a hard and fast rule) but I was disassociating and doing my very best to not think about the fact that there will be no more holidays for mom. She will never make it to Ireland or to any of the places she talked about seeing. I have been working myself to the bone to avoid the truth that my mom has been gone for the better part of a month and whether not I like it, time steadily marches on. Regardless of mine or anyone else's loss, regardless of whether or not I am prepared and ready for it. The next sunrise is already on its way. 

In some ways, I find comfort in that. The next sunrise, the next day... but in other moments it makes me freeze for a few minutes. Realized that there are an infinite amount of empty spaces that people I have loved have inhabited. I believe in ghosts now, but ghosts of my own design. Memories can haunt the empty places, spaces that used to be full of laughter, hugs, and love. The vacancy is ghosting every corner and every article or inanimate object imbued with history. 

So I blur my background. I blur the crowd and the spaces because it is so much simpler to unfocus than realize that I am being haunted.