New Year’s Eve, Again (2024)

“I had an emotion last week!” I reported to my therapist. “Oh! Tell me?” she nudged. I had been sitting next to Andy, my kind and patient partner, watching the Eagles tromp the Steelers. He had his arm around me, and I dipped my head to rest on his shoulder. The tears started a split second before I registered any emotion. I blinked them away once, twice, and again, trying to tamp down the somatic response as I sorted through the feelings behind them. I turned to Andy and gravely reported, “I have very bad news.” He raised an eyebrow. “I’m starting to feel attached to you.” This was a ridiculous thing to say, as Andy’s been living with me for a few months now. “Good?” he replied. “But you’re going to die,” I whispered, looking at his eyes just inches from mine, “and that will break my heart.”  

It’s the end of 2024, almost two and a half years since Mark died and over five years since his brain left most of reality behind. Grief status updates are not a thing, and there’s a reason for that. Grief, at least my grief, is a numbing, erratic, complex, non-linear mess. Like lungs pumping, the air goes into my life and then back out regularly. I have energy; I have none. I want to see people; I want to be left alone. I can plan ahead; I can only live in the moment. “What do you want for dinner tonight?” Andy asks at breakfast. “Why would you ask me such a crazy question?” I frequently reply. It’s difficult to explain why thinking nine hours ahead feels like asking me to plan my own retirement party by dusk, other than to say the obvious: I know that the next moment is not guaranteed. It might be good, it might be bad, it might not happen at all. So I will deal with that moment when it arrives at my threshold, not before. 

Andy paused at me declaring his future death during a Steelers’ game. “That’s true. I am going to die,” he said steadily looking at me, “and that will make you sad. But we can enjoy this while we have it.” I nodded and we went back to watching the game.

Grief is memory and memories are like flames; I do not touch them. I generally avoid even resting my eyes on them. If that sounds unhealthy to you, my therapist would agree. The possibility of even a glance at the heart of my grief feels like asking me to lift the gauze on a gangrenous wound. The sight, the smell, the damage – it’s all too much. This makes it difficult for me to carry on light conversations; it makes it difficult for me to carry on any conversations. How do you talk about small things when death looms for all of us? How do you talk about the fact that death looms for all of us? What is there even to say?

My therapist, who would like me to feel more, gently prodded. “Why did you start crying?” “Because I felt safe,” I choked out, “and it could all go away.” She nodded. “Well, that’s everything, right there.” All the pain, the trauma, the loss, the fears. 

Over the holidays, my house filled with laughter and love. Alma and their partner Adam, Mark’s three boys, Anya and her partner, Andy and me. I have a bunch of conversation starter card decks in my house; we went through a few of them. “What is your personal version of hell?” Alma read out loud as we sat around a fire, the Christmas tree lights shining. (Don’t you want to come to my house for Christmas?) Those present gamely answered. My first answer? “A small voice whispering in my ear all the mean things I’ve said about (our dysfunctional puppy) Flo.” My real answer was my second one: to witness others suffering.

That’s everything, right there. Life. The beauty and pain of it all. Many days, I’m still frozen in the midst of navigating grief’s glacial melt. The stark whiteness edged by rough grey gravel scree. The exquisite icebergs that can flip at any moment, revealing their giant dangerous blue underbellies. The quiet, the chill, the precarious beauty. 

2025 will come, one day at a time. Next to love will be grief; next to grief will be love. Fill the lungs with deep breaths; remember to breathe out.