Surfacing

I've been drowning in this grief for weeks--two and a half months, really--and I am finally experiencing the sensation of surfacing.

It doesn't last long.  But I emerge more and more frequently, long enough to feel the sunshine and get a gulp of oxygen before the tide of grief drags me back under.

Today the last of the snow could not withstand the onslaught of 74-degree temperatures.  I walked the dog--a long walk.  We must have wandered for an hour, far from our usual stomping ground, but still in the familiar city neighborhoods, anchored by Catholic schools and churches.  And I felt it at the time.  I was surfacing, relaxing, living.  Living without her.

It is kind of annoying, how good exercise makes me feel.  It's irritating to realize the extent to which I am at the mercy of my brain chemicals.  Stupid endorphins, able to make me feel better in spite of everything.

A few weeks ago, I bought a yoga groupon.  I realize now that buying it was kind of a leap of faith.  Eventually I'll feel good enough to use this.  At the time I bought it, I still wasn't leaving the house by myself.  And now?  I'm thinking about going on Sunday to the "Restorative Yoga" class.  It's supposed to be all meditative and shit.  I would have never imagined that I would be the sort of person who meditates (even though it is supposed to be good for you in all kinds of ways).  At this point, though, I'm willing to try anything that might bring me to the surface a little longer.

Today I surfaced long enough to realize how freaking lucky I am to only be teaching three days a week and working at the learning center on Saturdays.  It is such a gift to have time to myself--time to break down, time to read, time to breathe, time to recover from this loss.  I am so lucky that David has a good job and that I already completed my degree because I know I'd never finish that dissertation if it weren't already done.

Last night we watched the season premier of Survivor (I used to roll my eyes at this show, but David got me addicted and now I'm all Russell!  Boston Rob!).  For the longest time, watching TV took all my energy.  I mean, seriously.  Sitting on the couch and focusing on the television while mouth-breathing was pretty much the extent of my capabilities.  But last night, I watched TV while also looking at a magazine and I even tore out a picture of a skirt that I think I could copy.

So part of me surfaced long enough to assume that some day I'll revisit the fabric store and pull out my sewing machine.

I still spend many, many waking hours below the surface.  It's dark and scary and hard to breathe down there.  But sometimes it feels like that's where my baby is and that's why I need to be there.  Because when I lost her, that's where I was, and only by returning there, where things are the absolute worst and everything hurts more than I can possibly stand and tears are running not just down my face but all the way down my neck and my chest is heaving and I'm choking and curling up in a ball, only then could I possibly get back to her, to that last moment I had with her.  Sometimes I can't help it--I go back there because that's where I have to be in order to be close to her.

I know, I know that's not true.  I know it doesn't work that way.  But sometimes I still feel like it does.

So surfacing is a complicated thing.  It feels good, don't get me wrong.  It felt great today, to feel the unseasonably (unreasonably) warm sunshine as I walked the dogs.  It feels good to escape by reading novels again, finally able to get out of my own head long enough to follow a narrative, finally able to muster up enough feeling for something outside myself in order to care about a narrative.

It feels good to think about things besides this terrible sadness.  And yes, it also feels disloyal somehow.  Such a betrayal to go on living without her.  But I imagine what I would say to myself if I were outside of this.  If I were my own friend.  And I would say, "Oh, honey.  You have been plenty sad enough.  Don't begrudge yourself a few moments of relief.  I mean seriously."

So, yeah.  I'm surfacing.  Every once in a while.  Choking and sputtering and resisting.  But coming up for air all the same.