Weekend In Alma

First trip to Alma without Ron, but the Turtle comes along wherever I go

Went to Alma this past weekend for the first time without Ron, not counting his celebration of life service.  It was a hard weekend.  It had some good moments, like Friday night at the Pine Knot, enjoying pitchers of cheap beer with friends who loved and cared about Ron and let me talk about him incessantly.  But it had a lot of moments during which his loss seemed all the more pronounced to me.  I had a lot of people to see who are “Ron’s people” – his friends, his family.  Found myself in places I would not have been if it were not for Ron.  In some aspects, this is a way of staying connected to Ron.  I swap stories with his people and in doing so I think both parties feel his memory live on.  In other aspects, I find myself hurting all the more.  He should be here with me.  Where is he?  What am I doing here without him?

Additionally, Alma is laden with memories.  Perhaps particularly salient are the memories from when we were initially dating.  I spent many weekends coming up to visit him before he had a car.  I am reading about those early weekends as I go over our email exchanges from that time, so they are forefront in my mind.  It was such a different era in our relationship from the era that just ended.  I mourn both Rons – the healthier Ron and the sick Ron – but lately I have been especially mourning the healthier Ron from earlier in our relationship.  Going back to Alma makes me think of all that happened when I would visit him there . . . our many walks, our talks, our secret spot that neither of us has ever told anyone else about, lazy mornings and late nights in his apartment, Slurpees, carefree evenings when we could walk downtown to the bars, Pizza Sam’s, Rock Band, going on photo shooting adventures, the farmer’s market, etc.  Such sweet memories . . . yet they sting so badly with him gone.

I found myself becoming increasingly depressed as the weekend wore on.  This was frustrating to me, because I thought I had been doing relatively better when I left for Alma.  I have been warned about this.  I have been told that the grief comes and goes and that I should be prepared for it to resurface just when I think I am doing better.  Still, it was hard to feel so blue again after feeling like I had been making headway.

I drove home feeling really awful.  Missed having Ron in the car with me.  Did not find any joy in the music or scenery.  Cried a lot.  I ran through my latest irrational thought cycle over and over, following it down every stupid rabbit hole it beckons me through.  It makes my whole relationship with Ron meaningless.  I was nobody.  It could have been anybody who he loved and married.  Nothing matters.  I arrived home thoroughly miserable.

Once home, I started to feel a little better.  I sometimes just need to be around my/our things and to be reminded of the life we shared . . . even the sadder times near the end when I was caring for him.  We shared many moments here that are also private, between me and Ron only, that no one can take away, just like our secret spot in Alma.  No one really knows the full extent of what we said and did and meant to one another.  Deep down, I know it was real.  It did matter.  It was me and him.  We needed to be together.  It was different than anything either of us had known before.  In talking about this with my sister, she agreed and pointed out that I deserve to at least know that – to know it was real and it was special and he loved me so very much.  It could not have been just anyone else who he would have felt this way about or who would have loved him as much as I did and carried him through this long, hard cancer journey.  It was me.  Why I need to be reminded over and over of this is frustrating and makes me feel weak . . . but it is where I am at.

I spent hours last night reading emails back and forth between Ron and I from the first six weeks of our relationship.  They are tremendous.  They are amazing.  They make me so happy.  They are, hands down, the cutest love story I think I have ever read.  I am in love with both of us as I read them, as well as in love with the story that plays out.  I remember how happy we both made each other.  I can see it.  I know it.  I lived it.  There is a part of me that wants to shout these emails word for word from the rooftops.  There is another part of me that loves that they are between us, those pieces no one else knows about.  Either way, they are proof.  Evidence.  I was so loved by him.  He was (and is still) so loved by me. 

I went to sleep with a much lighter and happier heart.  I awoke alone.  Went through the same process I do every day - realizing he is gone and I am by myself now.  I reminded myself of the emails . . . so bittersweet, the way they make me feel the love so strongly and then echo back against the emptiness that is in my hallow life now.  I hug a pillow and cry pretty much every morning.

I don’t know what to do.  I feel like I am losing ground to the sadness and hopelessness more than I am overcoming it.

For now, I need to go get around so I can go into work.  Last week ended up not all being as wonderful as my first day back, but, all in all, I know it is right for me to be going there.  It is building a routine.  It is making me more tired in the evenings (this is a good thing and makes me hopeful I won’t need a sleeping pill for the rest of my life).  It is forcing me to be accountable toward others.  It is forcing me to have some social interactions.  It distracts me from my sorrow, even if just a little. 

I want to thank the people who are reaching out to me.  I know I am a recluse and I don’t make very solid plans with anyone.  I just can’t right now, so thanks to those who can be spontaneous and flexible.  I know I am a bummer of a person to talk to and be around right now.  I can’t help that.  I can’t say when I will feel better.  But to those who can hang with it, thank you.  Thank you for listening.  Thank you for letting me talk all about Ron, all the time.  Thank you for letting me know you are there for me if and when I need you.  You have no idea what it means to me.  Please don’t stop.  I need support.  I need people to understand I will have okay and bad days and that they will go back and forth.  I am hurting more than I ever let on . . . even in these sad blog posts, even with my communication with my closest and dearest, even when I see the therapist, grief counselor, and doctor.  I am great at presenting really well when underneath I am not.

Only Ron knows, from my constant writing and talking to him, what is really going on in my head and my heart.  Unfortunately, he is not here to support me in the physical world.  And as much as I would like to live in crazyland where I have a relationship with only him and don’t talk to a living soul, I need to be a part of this world if I am to stay in it.