Endings and Beginnings

Mary passed away Saturday night. A pain shoots through my stomach as I type those words and my eyes fill with tears. I have never been so thoroughly grief-stricken as I am now. I miss her so much! What I would give to have her back. I think of little moments and just can't believe they are gone and can be no more. I just think, no, no, no...this just can't be. I want my Mary back! I feel like someone has taken part of me away, as if they have physically stripped me of part of myself. I don't feel her here with me at all and I'm so, so, so very afraid of forgetting her! Isn't that insane? I've written a blog and have so many pictures and little videos of her...how could I forget her?! She was my purpose in life, though. I feel so lost, so directionless. I even keep getting this little feeling in my stomach that I should get home, as if she's there waiting for me. I've been staying at Mom's, but others will be coming into town, so I'll need to go back to the house after tomorrow night, I guess. But I don't want to be there alone with Jo. Isn't that weird? It's just that it's so not right. In the sense of what the reality should be, not any moral sense or anything. It's like it doesn't compute. I'm so glad I have the dogs! Isn't that crazy? But they're such a bit of normalcy for me. And something to love and lavish affection on.

I don't think I can write about what happened. I've talked about it, but to see the words in front of me...I don't think I could bear it. I still feel her body, though. I didn't want to let go of it. Isn't this just so purely selfish? I'm being such a baby. I'm not thinking of Mary at all. She didn't want to go. She didn't expect it. I didn't either. I hope she didn't realize what was happening to her. Oh, how I hope that! That really hurts to imagine that she did. No, I can't believe she really did. I think it happened so fast that if the idea had occurred to her, she wouldn't have had time to pursue it. I just want her back so badly. I could write that over and over. Fill a notebook and I'd still feel it so intensely. She was my A and O. Do they say that in English?

And I'm so bewildered by what is to come. It doesn't seem real. I can't see it at all. I can't see myself living somewhere else, having a job, living some strange and lonely life without my Mary. Yet I see, too, how many people care for me. I have gotten so much support. My life with Mary has not been isolated and, knowing myself, it will not be isolated in the future, but I feel the impact of loneliness and the knowledge that I am now fully alone hits me like a weight on my chest and a blast of air that knocks my breath out of me, like when I was a child and fell off the bunk bed and had the air knocked out of my lungs. I have to tell myself, "Breath in. Breath out," over and over again. I open the door a bit and the fear starts to ooze in before I push it quickly closed again with the force of my whole weight against it. I'm so afraid of this fear. I've felt physically dizzy and nauseated the last few days. I laugh but feel the tears behind my eyes all the while. I can't eat anything but bread and drink only tea. I feel hunger but have no appetite. I want my Mary back! I must have never really believed she would leave me. Stupid, huh?

So now begins Life without Auntie Mary. But will my life ever be without her? Hasn't she become some integral part of me? I have her, I have her--but I still want her back! I know, get over it. But I dont' want to. The pain of not having her seems so unbearable. I feel like I'm two people now. How can I explain that? It's so bizarre. It was like a marriage, you know? Where they say, "Two become as one." I always sort of thought that was a sexual reference, but now I completely understand. That's why I feel like a part of me has been physically stripped away.

But life must go on, mustn't it? Mary lost three husbands and still went on. She didn't seem to waste much time grieving. She got on with life. She didn't wallow in sorrow. I'll clean the house. It's time for spring cleaning. And this will be for Mary. I have a lot of paperwork to get in order. I feel like an animal that will be shedding its skin or transforming into something else. The episode of my life taking care of Mary seemed such a gradual transformation, but this one is preceded by a crack. There will be gradual changes but there was the gut-, mind-, and heart-wrenching break with the past first. Who will I become now? What direction will my compass settle on? What form will this new existence, this new creature take?

I'm tired. So, so tired. I was tired before and so was Mary. Her body was more tired than she knew, I think. I'm tired out from grief. Thank God for that! Thank God that crying wears a person out. It's as good as hot milk. I'm reading through this blog and contemplating things for maybe the last time, such as who was Mary, really? What is the essence of a person? So I'll stop now in preparation for going on soon.