Con Te Partiro

I made it through Thanksgiving. (The American one. Canadians did it first, a month ago.)


I spoke to my parents and brother, and went over to the Fraternity brother's dinner.
I ended up helping to cook and clean. It was good, kept myself busy and distracted. I enjoyed several moments. I did not even cry until I came home.

I am thankful Wash had a good sense of people. He truly made some wonderful friends in his life who have "adopted" me in a way.
It helps a lot.

Most of my very small group of friends is no longer local. Some that are decided shortly after Wash became ill to just... abandon us. "Come get your stuff you loaned us or I'm throwing it away!"
Suddenly, no more friends to help plan weddings.

No more local friends Graduating.

I cannot stand to be around pregnant or new children yet. The happiness and joy they produce feels like mortal pain to me.

Wash wanted something very specific and Doctor Who related to be done before his memorial service.
I have the supplies. I just cannot bring myself emotionally to do it.
"The Impossible Astronaut"

Except my Time Lord does not come back. There is no second chance. There is no way to cheat Death, not in a long-term.


His TARDIS urn is in the same place. It does not feel like *he* is inside though.
I look at it, and it is beautiful. It is art. It is love. It is Form and Function.

But my Love has become Stardust.

The Memorial is set. Invitations sent, plane tickets bought, pies being made.

This is the hard part. Not watching him in the hospital NuICU, not the wait of the two brain surgeries, not the fights for insurance. Midnight hours of vomiting and pain.
The moments he looked at me with just a little hesitation, willing himself to recall.
The anger. The fights. The physical pain.
Sleep deprivation. Going hungry to keep him fed.
What seemed like a steep climb was no more than an anthill.

This is my Everest, my Kilimanjaro. The 'After'.
The 'Alone'.

The Silence.

Such silence.


He was my best friend for 4 years. My husband for more than 3.
When he became sick, I became his memory.
He told me everything. All he could recall. His feelings. His jokes, and his pain.
I feel like there are two people living in my brain now.
I can hear myself, my inner voice. My Asperger brain continues to think, to ponder, to calculate.
Yet, at the same time, I can always hear him. Sometimes his voice is his, sometimes his words are my own voice. I look outside at my Throne he made for me, and I can remember his descriptions of how he built it. I can remember the nights, his clothes, the smell the welding burns. I can see all the sketches he drew of it, start to finish.
I watch a show; something new or something we have enjoyed before, and I can hear his commentary in my head. I can see his face light up at seeing his favourite actors, yet he's been gone two months.
I look at buildings and architecture like I never have before. I care because of him.

I have not been able to watch any new Doctor Who or Fringe yet.
I wish I was strong enough to. It is overwhelming. Like experiencing emotions from two people at the same time. I wish I could not just recall how much he loved those shows; I wish it did not hurt so much to continue with them right now.
Sensory and emotional overload.

He gave me such love.

He worked so hard to love me, to help show me not to write off all of Humanity.
I don't think there will ever be anyone like him again, not in the ways he was special.
Wash taught me it was possible though. Even at 6 Billion to 1 odds.
6 Billion in my mortal lifetime.

I ignore the probability, to hold onto the possibility Humanity might have someone like him again. The probability is I will not be alive to see who it is, but there is a possibility it can happen again.

My Love is over, in the living sense.


The world does not stop. It cannot. Not for one death. Not for one person. Society would not function unless we had to move on, forget.
But, the world moves, I still have not.
I have no career to go back to.
I have no children to tend or raise.
I have no interest in spending time trying to find a school to give me loans, to finish a degree I won't use.
I have no decades of memories and life to comfort me.
I have no idea what I would even want to do now, with my life, with a long future.

Half the people in my life are telling me to take time for myself right now, go slow, heal myself first.
Half the people in my life are telling me to start moving on, get a job, go finish my degree, move homes.

That's the one thing the WashVoice in my head stays quite silent about. 'Where do we go from here?'

Nothing but the silence of time, space, all eternity.


Mortality is so fleeting. I cannot comprehend setting aside literally one day to "give Thanks".
I had love for 1575 days with my husband.
I was thankful for every one.
I am thankful we made a point to tell each other every day and every night before we fell asleep that we loved each other.
Every night.

We are fragile. We are flesh. We are not forever, like the wind or Silence.

Yet, the chance is there. Another body, another life, another chance for that Love.

Sons

When every day you wake and are just thankful for nothing more than that, when you find thanks in your husband remembering your name, when you are thankful for just one more day with no bills calling, when you are thankful for what you have had, not what has been lost...

My thanks does not need to come at the memory of a group of indigenous deaths.

Turkey day did not go to plan. We were supposed to head up North to a friends' home but I cocked things up. My doctor did not give me good news this week and I might have to have a small surgery soon if things do not begin to get better with myself. So, this boiled over Wednesday night and I got very very very ill. Could not drive, barely able to come out of the bathroom. I'm still not better today and we're both hoping to see relatives today.

I'm trying to not be scared, or mad, or upset, but it's not easy. I do not want another emergency type of surgery like my gallbladder which melted inside me. I'm trying to stay ahead of my body, but it really likes to fuck with me.

Mostly I'm just scared.

I'm scared because we have so many bills right now. Wash has had extra doctor visits with his Neurologist ($760 per visit) and after a week with insurance fuckery he's finally going in to see the Epilepsy specialist and they won't even tell me how much out of pocket that will be. And then there's my own medical bills for my issues, co-pays, medicine. And I worry, if I do have to have surgery again who will look after Wash? Or even me?

I've just been depressed. It seems like every time we manage to find something with Hope, some little thing to keep us both going, both wanting to live, Life or Cancer finds a way to rip it from us.

Having terminal cancer in your mid twenties changes everything. It's been two years. Two years of living, and not. Two years of heart beats, tears, medication, poison, laughs, hugs. And two years of a "not life". Two years with no paying work, with no schooling, with no real hope for any real tangible future.

What kind of a life is it that I seem to be fucking up so badly?

I miss having feelings. More than just "what else?". More than just a resigned acceptance that my heart beats regardless of my desires.

Two years standing still watching the world, my friends, my future pass by.

It's all just going through the motions. Playing a part.

It feels like a long night swim where the land moves away, the light fades until there are just stars. Just the water and stars. And while the stars dazzle, the water just pulls, and pulls, and pulls, before long the stars are not twinkling so bright, and the water begins to take away the air, just wet, and enveloping, and cold- never noticed before how cold it gets, and then the stars blink out. There is just a feeling of coldness and the urge to fight, where it should be- all used up. The water welcomes and hugs and draws down, and the stars blink out to black.

The honest truth is, some days I see myself sadly and lifelessly going on after Wash dies. And other times I hope with every last part of my being I'll go an hour after he does.

I've had two years of playing "Groundhog Day" with my husband. For that I am beyond a way to describe my thanks. That's two years more than any of us thought when he was in the hospital with a tumor the side of a newborn's head crushing his brain. Two more years of hugs, and kisses, and "I love you", and every little wonderful moment we were allowed to have, than others with his cancer. I know that, and I am thankful. It could be worse, sometimes I am not sure how, but I know it can be.

I just wonder, does it ever get better? Does the pain ever really let up, or is it just the mental scar tissue caused by years of time and distance?

I feel like a fool for trying. I feel like a fool for believing that things could change. I need Hope to keep going, to keep myself living, and I feel like a gorram fool every time for having Hope.