Day #119: Surrounded by Grief
Three big transitions are happening right now:
1) My husband's last day at his job was today. He's employable, his job search is ongoing, but this was his dream job and it's not replaceable. He's grieving.
2) My BFF is having her 15 year old cat who has been through life with her put down tomorrow. She's grieving.
3) Our neighbor who James has played with through the fence for 2+ years now has moved. Not far, but when you're 6 the difference between your backyard and and one mile away is really long. A new family with 6 kids is expected to move in but no one is sure when or what that will look like for James. He's...confused...excited, sad, all the feelings.
I am not always great at other people's grief. I don't think Max is either. He's hyped up and not sleeping well at all. I think he's feeling things are different and isn't quite sure what to do with it.
Honestly, that's kinda where it feels like the world is right now. Everyone's emotions are REALLY BIG. Fear, anxiety, anger, sadness, shame, grief, helplessness, rage, loneliness, uncertainty...everybody is a mix of all of those things. And at first we were really good at kinda building each other up and being supports through it all. But it's now been four months. We are all really tired and no one is great at handling anyone else's emotions right now. So everyone is a giant tinderbox and there's a lot of turning on each other because we are human and incredibly good at that.
I don't have great answers. I haven't been the most supportive to the three people closest to me who are grieving. I'm not always patient with them either.
Max's suggestion was a walk. He's not wrong. Max has good ideas. I've said before that we all do better when we listen to Max. Walking is free and it's open. Those are two biggies right now.
We did one of our drives around to look at little free libraries yesterday. That helped, until Max got impatient with the lack of walking. Reading helps. I couldn't understand why James let Max and I sleep in this morning...this is very unlike James. Then he said to me "Mama, I ate breakfast in bed. I had a carrot, a banana, and two pieces of bread." Turns out he woke up, went and got the food, brought it and the pile of books from yesterday into his bed and read them for awhile. Reading helps. We would all probably do better if we listened to James, too.
Notice both of their solutions involved turning off screens. A very big key. I should do that more. Especially after seeing the world's most depressing meme today. It was a response to coronvirus spikes all over the U.S. It basically said the last 3 months didn't count, we should understand that we are starting over.
I don't know how much the last three months controlled coronavirus. It kinda depends on where you are. If you live in New York, it for sure is better now than it was then. If you live in Arizona, not so much. For those of us here in western Washington, we are currently holding fairly steady. Numbers have ticked up but not in a way that terrifies me. I'm taking my sister's advice and watching hospitalization numbers rather than case numbers because they don't fluctuate as much because of testing and other external factors, and if that's the number we go by we are not worse than we were a couple of months ago.
But whether the last three months (here it's four) worked or not, they happened. They are real. They count. We all lived through them, and we all got a little tougher and a little more beaten down because of them. We deserve to take a minute and honor that. Honor the 120,000 people who died and many more who were very very sick. Honor the kids who got pulled out of school and had their lives turned upside down. Honor the jobs lost and the people who struggled and the food workers and grocery clerks and delivery drivers who held the world together.
It's not over. It will probably get a lot worse before it gets better. But those of us who have been through it have also gotten tougher. And we can handle it. But we have to stick with the things that help because a lot of what we are doing isn't helping, it's just making things worse. So I think I'm going to try to spend more time listening to my kids.
Also, a lot of people are grieving all around, so maybe a good cry now and then helps too.
Media consumption: I finished With the Fire on High and while driving to get Max to sleep I listened to 2 sections of Stamped: Remix read by Jason Reynolds. "If Zurara was the world's first racist, Thomas Jefferson may have been the first to say 'I have black friends.'" That's a good line.
Today I'm grateful for 5 years at Josh's job, walking, walking with the dog, books, audiobooks, sleeping in even if it was with Max, raising readers, that Max is finally asleep and I don't have to sleep with him, comfort food.
1) My husband's last day at his job was today. He's employable, his job search is ongoing, but this was his dream job and it's not replaceable. He's grieving.
2) My BFF is having her 15 year old cat who has been through life with her put down tomorrow. She's grieving.
3) Our neighbor who James has played with through the fence for 2+ years now has moved. Not far, but when you're 6 the difference between your backyard and and one mile away is really long. A new family with 6 kids is expected to move in but no one is sure when or what that will look like for James. He's...confused...excited, sad, all the feelings.
I am not always great at other people's grief. I don't think Max is either. He's hyped up and not sleeping well at all. I think he's feeling things are different and isn't quite sure what to do with it.
Honestly, that's kinda where it feels like the world is right now. Everyone's emotions are REALLY BIG. Fear, anxiety, anger, sadness, shame, grief, helplessness, rage, loneliness, uncertainty...everybody is a mix of all of those things. And at first we were really good at kinda building each other up and being supports through it all. But it's now been four months. We are all really tired and no one is great at handling anyone else's emotions right now. So everyone is a giant tinderbox and there's a lot of turning on each other because we are human and incredibly good at that.
I don't have great answers. I haven't been the most supportive to the three people closest to me who are grieving. I'm not always patient with them either.
Max's suggestion was a walk. He's not wrong. Max has good ideas. I've said before that we all do better when we listen to Max. Walking is free and it's open. Those are two biggies right now.
We did one of our drives around to look at little free libraries yesterday. That helped, until Max got impatient with the lack of walking. Reading helps. I couldn't understand why James let Max and I sleep in this morning...this is very unlike James. Then he said to me "Mama, I ate breakfast in bed. I had a carrot, a banana, and two pieces of bread." Turns out he woke up, went and got the food, brought it and the pile of books from yesterday into his bed and read them for awhile. Reading helps. We would all probably do better if we listened to James, too.
Notice both of their solutions involved turning off screens. A very big key. I should do that more. Especially after seeing the world's most depressing meme today. It was a response to coronvirus spikes all over the U.S. It basically said the last 3 months didn't count, we should understand that we are starting over.
I don't know how much the last three months controlled coronavirus. It kinda depends on where you are. If you live in New York, it for sure is better now than it was then. If you live in Arizona, not so much. For those of us here in western Washington, we are currently holding fairly steady. Numbers have ticked up but not in a way that terrifies me. I'm taking my sister's advice and watching hospitalization numbers rather than case numbers because they don't fluctuate as much because of testing and other external factors, and if that's the number we go by we are not worse than we were a couple of months ago.
But whether the last three months (here it's four) worked or not, they happened. They are real. They count. We all lived through them, and we all got a little tougher and a little more beaten down because of them. We deserve to take a minute and honor that. Honor the 120,000 people who died and many more who were very very sick. Honor the kids who got pulled out of school and had their lives turned upside down. Honor the jobs lost and the people who struggled and the food workers and grocery clerks and delivery drivers who held the world together.
It's not over. It will probably get a lot worse before it gets better. But those of us who have been through it have also gotten tougher. And we can handle it. But we have to stick with the things that help because a lot of what we are doing isn't helping, it's just making things worse. So I think I'm going to try to spend more time listening to my kids.
Also, a lot of people are grieving all around, so maybe a good cry now and then helps too.
Media consumption: I finished With the Fire on High and while driving to get Max to sleep I listened to 2 sections of Stamped: Remix read by Jason Reynolds. "If Zurara was the world's first racist, Thomas Jefferson may have been the first to say 'I have black friends.'" That's a good line.
Today I'm grateful for 5 years at Josh's job, walking, walking with the dog, books, audiobooks, sleeping in even if it was with Max, raising readers, that Max is finally asleep and I don't have to sleep with him, comfort food.
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