#SOL16: Time

I.

Watercolor on Yupo Paper (August 2016)

I wonder how long it will be? How much time needs to pass before I no longer feel that sickening shock when I acknowledge that Rob has died. And it is shock--not that he is dead, but rather that he died. I realize that those might seem like the same statement, but they are not. I still can't believe that someone so good, so young has died. Yesterday I was food shopping when I felt my stomach sour as I realize that the package of fig bars I had just put in my cart I didn't need. It was something only Rob loved--something I would routinely buy for him. There are habits of the heart and habits of the body we cannot outrun.

II.

Yesterday, I felt blindsided--unprepared for the sadness that felt so heavy. I was shaky at times as if the adrenaline I felt was an untapped river flowing. I hadn't experienced this since the end of last April--almost two months after Rob's death. And last night I thought how the more time moves along the harder it all seems to feel.

Time passing is hardly reliable.

III.

A few nights ago Devon and I sat together talking about his dad. It was a tough, emotional evening. We made some time to just talk about what Rob has meant to each of us.  I mentioned how intense the feelings of loss suddenly are again and Dev reminded me what I had told him shortly after Rob died. I said then that the intensity of feeling doesn't ebb much over time, but the duration and frequency does.  I was telling Devon how I felt after my mom's death and he reminded me of those words again last night.

Time bends, he said. What's longer: A year? A day? 28 years?  Time is relative. It's how you spend that time that gives it shape.  We're lucky to have had the time we did with Dad.  You've said this to me. You lived so much. You and dad didn't wait to live. 

No, we didn't and I am grateful, I tell him. But truly I wanted another 28 years.

IV.

These days I know that gratitude doesn't remove sorrow.  It may soften it a bit, but sorrow remains like a river flowing. Sorrow is more aquifer than pool. It moves beneath me as I walk through each day, surfacing at breaking points, yet always present.