Today is six months since Matt's death. I am relieved to feel time passing, getting us further and further from that moment of horror and pain. But it also means that the finality of it is starting to sink in-- all his chances and options were suddenly closed off and there will never be any explanations or answers or happy endings for him. I've found unfinished screenplays in his work notebooks. I've found journals with just one or two entries. And that's it.
When someone dies by suicide, they don't get rid of their unbearable, impossible pain. They give it to their families-- to their children.
Right now we are still struggling to breathe under the weight of that sudden horrifying tsunami of pain, and trying to find ways to understand it, forgive it, be gentle with it, move through it and with it, transform it from jagged spikes into rolling waves. It's already been six months. It's only been six months. Time expands and contracts weirdly with death-- it was yesterday-- it was another lifetime.
But it's also thanksgiving time. And I'm filled with gratitude. I'm so grateful for my grandmother who allows me to make her meals and clutter up her life with kid art and wild gigglers, and for the seasons turning from ripe fall into stark and thoughtful winter. I'm grateful for the made-family that has come around me and mine.
And I'm thankful for a memory like this that makes me smile. This was his version of a love note. He stacked MY favorite books on the goat cheese to press it, and left it there for me to find in the hurry and scurry of the day. I saw it. There were good moments. They can sweeten the darkness.
When someone dies by suicide, they don't get rid of their unbearable, impossible pain. They give it to their families-- to their children.
Right now we are still struggling to breathe under the weight of that sudden horrifying tsunami of pain, and trying to find ways to understand it, forgive it, be gentle with it, move through it and with it, transform it from jagged spikes into rolling waves. It's already been six months. It's only been six months. Time expands and contracts weirdly with death-- it was yesterday-- it was another lifetime.
But it's also thanksgiving time. And I'm filled with gratitude. I'm so grateful for my grandmother who allows me to make her meals and clutter up her life with kid art and wild gigglers, and for the seasons turning from ripe fall into stark and thoughtful winter. I'm grateful for the made-family that has come around me and mine.
And I'm thankful for a memory like this that makes me smile. This was his version of a love note. He stacked MY favorite books on the goat cheese to press it, and left it there for me to find in the hurry and scurry of the day. I saw it. There were good moments. They can sweeten the darkness.
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| Matt's cheese-making is a literary process. Special thanks to JK Rowling, JRR Tolkien, Ray Bradbury and CS Lewis. And the goats. |
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