melissa

Sunday, August 21

1. No work for the weary.

2. This video of the Civil Wars singing my favorite Leonard Cohen song at my favorite little store in my college town. Lots of favorites.

3. Writing a letter on purple paper.

This news made my day/week/month/year. FINALLY!

I’ve lost people close to me before this, but losing E just feels WRONG. With my grandmother and other family members, it wasn’t a shock, and even when a friend of mine from college died last year, we had the knowledge that she had been born with heart problems. E shouldn’t be dead. I cannot fucking wrap my head around this at all.

I feel like it should have completely sunk in by now, but still I catch myself picking up the phone to call her and expecting it be her when my phone rings. All day today, I wanted to call her so bad it was killing me. I want to tell her how fucked up it is that she died, and the thing is, out of all my friends, she would have been the one that got the absurdity of the situation.

People keep calling me and asking about the funeral arrangements, and I don’t want to talk about it. My mom keeps checking on me and asking if I need to talk, and I just don’t. I want them all to leave me alone, and I don’t know how to say that without sounding insane. I don’t want to talk about the funeral. I don’t want you to ask my opinion on what flowers to send. I don’t want you to call me just to talk about her. I know she’s gone, but having to talk about it makes it so real. I can’t deal with the realness of this shit at all.

I know my friends are there for me and I know they’re hurting too, but goddamn it, I wish they’d call somebody else. Today, I almost blew my lid when someone talked about her in the past tense. She still feels present to me, and talking about her in the past tense feels like a slap in the face.

On top of feeling like I’m getting punched in the gut every five minutes, I just feel so damn guilty about not being stronger for everyone else. I’ve always been the one that you could call and talk through stuff with. I’ve been the shoulder to lean on in times like this, and now I just can’t. I’m failing everyone around me, and I don’t know how to be the person they need right now.

I know they mean well, but I just can’t deal with the people around me. I feel like I’m going to snap. I’m just so fucking MAD about this whole situation, and every conversation is just making it worse. I want to scream and break things and punch holes in the wall, and when I listen to my friends being so calm and handling this so much better than I am, I just want to lose it. No, I don’t want to go shopping so you can find black shoes for the funeral. No, I don’t know if you should take food to her parents’ house. No, I don’t know if it’s normal for an autopsy to take this long. I don’t fucking know, and I wish they’d stop asking me!

I really am thankful that I’ve got such great people around me, but I am not dealing with this like they are. They’re huddling closer to each other, and I want to be left alone. I just don’t know how to tell them this. I feel like I should be stepping up to the plate right now, and instead I’m letting everyone down.

How do you tell people who are hurting to go the hell away?