Sometimes when I am working, there will be a long meeting or conversation, in which nothing of true import is being discussed. If it goes on long enough, I start to get an anxious feeling -- it starts low and slowly works its way up. At some point, I just need to stop and go walk or cry or meditate or play music. I am starting to figure out what is going on. During much of the day, I am in "unconscious denial" that Lev is no longer a part of my world. I have the same house, same job, same wife, same life. It all looks so similar that I can almost forget that anything has changed. But of course everything has changed. And sometimes these conflicting views of reality collide, which causes a vague and rising anxiety to manifest itself.
The temporary cure is to stop what I am doing and acknowledge what has happened to me. Sometimes it is like getting hit by a freight train when the truth washes over and through me.
In the long term, the path to inner peace is to deeply integrate the fact that Lev is dead into all facets of my existence. But that kind of reconciliation seems unreachable right now. I will continue to strive for it.
