Understanding Forever

Every day it gets closer
Looming
Day after day, he's still gone
It will repeat, endlessly
That is forever
I begin to understand
The vast openness of a desert
Sadness stretching out before us
Sand shifts on the dune
Never again eat a banana
Never munch on grapes
Never play Disturbed too loud
Never argue about missing assignments
Just one more chance
Then it wouldn't be forever
To go back and change the past
How it aches
Forever
It is too long
Endless
It is never
I miss you

The impending empty nest

Jaal leaves tomorrow.
We all head down to Seattle.
He will play with Tony's band.
Then, stay with friends and head out to Olympia.
His professors know his situation.
They want to help and understand.
I hope his friends are understanding.
Jaal will hold it together.
He misses Lev, yet keeps it mostly hidden.
The teary eyes, the little comments.
Family counseling fun.
He is worried about us.
I am worried about us.
The house will be empty, lonely, vacant
We need to move, we know it.
Being with Jaal drives my days.
I love to feed him, be with him, do whatever as long as it's together
I am not ready for the empty nest
It is a nest that has been destroyed
It must be rebuilt with fragments of our old selves
Laced with sadness and despair
I miss him.
I wonder why he won't come back soon
I wait, still.
Denial allowing me some moments of peace
Too much loss

Appearing fine

Just back from Open House at my school. People at work seem to think I'm doing very well - inspiring for others that have dealt with grief, etc. But it's just because I'm good at putting on a happy face and getting through the day.

It is good to go to work and get things done, usually.  But, then if I appear too competent I get more work and higher expectations. Really, I'm doing far worse than they imagine.

Would it be better to just let myself fall apart? I don't think so, but there is no right or wrong in this raw deal we have.

My Wayward Son

Carry on my wayward son, they'll be peace when you are done.

I have lost my wayward son, I can't stop from crying again and again this evening.

I came home form work at 1, since I'm working part time this month. We had lunch together, Jaal, Tony and I. Then, we did some garden work. I have been into destroying weeds with a hoe or shovel, and Jaal enjoyed transplanting huge ferns from the edges of our land. Then, I went back to work for a two hour meeting all about the "why" of what we are doing, trying to educate all students. All the ones that don't mysteriously die on you.

On the way to the meeting, I checked my email on my phone to make sure that things didn't combust at school while I was gone. (I do have another principal helping out in the afternoons). I read an email from someone that read our blog - we haven't gone fully public yet - and it made me cry, which felt good. Then, I got it together and participated in a meeting about our life purpose in education...

Jaal and Tony picked me up at the district office, and we went to Bellingham to get some final things for Jaal for college - shoes and a tent. We realized we have an extra two person tent now. We wouldn't need two two person tents, as we are only three. I cried in the check out line, but no one noticed. Then, we went to the mall where Jaal got shoes. The last time I was in the mall I helped Lev buy a present for Melissa, while Jaal was buying shoes.

After that, we let Jaal choose where to eat. He is disturbed by being asked to choose a restaurant. It is not his normal role, yet he is only with us a few more days, so he gets special treatment. He wants us all to be happy with it, so checks with us that we're sure it's okay.

We went to La Fiamma Pizza. I remember our last time there with Lev. The silverware is wrapped in little paper strips, and while Lev went to the bathroom I wrote fortunes on them and convinced him that the restaurant gave us silverware with fortunes. He was amazed that the fortunes were exactly perfect for each one of us, and although I can't remember what I wrote on his - maybe "you will get a great hat and it will look fantastic on you" but I truly have no idea what I wrote, I remember the moment - our amusement that Lev thought the world was so magical that we could get perfect fortunes, each one of us. He didn't realize it was a joke until I laughed, and gave him a knowing look. Then he was mad at being fooled, but only for a moment. We talked about all the other perfect fortunes we could have written. It was a good night.

Tony and I split a bottle of wine, as Jaal was driving, and ordered a brownie sundae, too. My motto was that we had better well enjoy our life, as it's all we have.

Then, in the car on the way home, Jaal drove and I sat in front. The song, "Carry on My Wayward Son" by Kansas, was on the radio. Jaal and Tony were singing. And, I cried, and cried and cried. Silently, but tears steaming down my face. Jaal looked over at me, but he knew and kept driving. He had become accustomed to our crying, sighing, collapsing with our head on the table, staring into space, randomly hugging him, etc, etc. He stays focused on driving, and chugs along in life, making due with our lot, and going on as best he can. He misses Lev, but sees a future for us and himself, as much as I understand his emotions.

Tony said he was not surprised that I cried and cried, as that happens after I get a little manic, there is always the down to the trying to squeeze any bit of life.

The last couple days I have been thinking of how incredible and unfair it is. For Lev to feel like he is coming down with the flu and then die in his sleep is so inconceivable. The only reason we were even able to try and save him was because we were in a tent together, at home we would have just found him him in the morning. I am glad we were there for him, but I am tormented with his image in the hospital and ambulance, by his grabbing for my thumb in seizure in the tent. It haunts me still.

I'm not sure how I go on, dealing with the miniscule details of life, my job, etc. Tomorrow we lose a teacher and have to switch around lots of classes. I'm sure there will be lots of unhappy parents, then Open House. Oh well, life goes on for them.

A part of me just wants to call it a day and go join an ashram in India, or something. But, we chug on with our lives as if they will ever be the same.

Why do others get to keep their kids? Why not us?

Jaal goes to college in two days. He will need a break from us, a chance to enjoy his life away from such grief. We will miss him, but it is best. I am happy for him. I feel like we failed Lev, somehow could not save him, but Jaal is fully cooked, he is ready.

I wish him well, with all the love in my heart. It is so much it overwhelms him, but he understands.

Jaal and me and the Lorax, we understand. The only sad stuffed animal. So sad for what the world has become.

There is no "unless" for us, just the smog smuggered skies. Even if you care a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better, it's not.

So he will lift himself by the seat of his pants and take leave of himself, through a hole in the sky.

No day has gone by that I have not thought about Lev. I miss talking to him over the phone and having him over in the summer. I remember that last summer the one thing I was really looking forward to him coming. I was so excited I made a folder on Microsoft Word that were ideas of what to do when he was here, now I have no idea what to do with it. Right now it is just sitting on the computer half-finished.

School started and it was hard to get through the basic routine of the day. At six thirty pm. (around the time when I would call him or vice versa) I was devastated, and still am every day at that time. One of the hardest things about school is how little it has changed when I have changed so profoudly. My friends are the same old people unnaffected by this thing that has changed me utterly and completly. I sit there and try to act normal while they are completely unaware of the tremendous sadness that is lurking under the surface of normality.

Don't want to return them

I just saw the return receipt for the boxing gear I bought for Lev. We were going to have so much fun with them: helmet, gloves, pads. He really loved boxing, it was something we did together and enjoyed.

I don't want to return these things, I want to use them, dammit! Why the hell did he have to go, I want him here with me! I have lost this huge slice of my life. This is so horrible.

The presence of his absence

The shock of Lev's death has worn off. The "acute grief", where we are frequently racked with sobs, is starting to ease. What we are left with is something deeper: the intense awareness of his absence. I am missing him more directly, more physically. How it hurts! I so want to see him, to play with him, to talk to him. Knowing that will never happen is beyond sad — it is a yearning that grows each day, yet can never be satisfied. My love for him pours out, but it has nowhere to go. I had become so used to being with him each day that to have him gone feels so wrong; the world is fundamentally out of whack.

We have started to pack up and organize some of the miscellaneous things around the house, in the garage, etc. It is so hard, because Lev's things and memories are everywhere. It reminds us so directly that he is gone. We treasure some of these items as keepsakes, but they are but shadows of the person we loved.

Sad

Caffeine high

Tony made the astute observation today at lunch that caffeine is the only thing that alleviates the grief a bit. Wine intensifies it.

We had coffee today. I was buzzed and effective at work this morning. I got a lot done, And I felt like the big and little decisions I was making actually made a difference. Checking in with teachers and letting them know when I noticed them doing something excellent, checking in with kids that got in trouble a lot last year, but haven't this year, giving the approval to buy more recess balls, correctly editing the schedule to adapt to the upcoming changes. It all went well. Then I came home at one and ate lunch and then took an hour to kind of come off the buzz of work and my one cup of coffee. Then the sadness sets back in.

Usually I am in touch with the grief, just a bit sad all the time, sometimes more and less intense, and sometimes debilitating. But then there are the times when I am removed from it, only to be swiftly and completely returned to my current reality. I have to tell myself that Lev really isn't coming back. It seems too hard to believe. A part of me is still waiting. I can't bare to go to his room and acknowledge that we are not saving it for him. I feel like he is away at camp but will be back soon. How can he really have died. So suddenly and completely. It is so wrong.

Twinkie-eating, soda-drinking kids survive. I didn't know his body was so weak. I wish we had known. then we could have done something. I still don't understand it. I don't want to accept it.

Lev on top of the world. June 2010

Lev and snowy

Doug and Lev

Snowy on the empty seat on the way home