Long time, no write

Where to begin?

And now I feel guilty. Isn't that silly? To feel guilty about not writing to an internet audience. I suppose what I really feel guilty about is not having captured this last month, not having captured the ups and downs, highs and lows of this crazy time. I have been at both my lowest and my most optimistic, but I haven't stayed at either for long enough to capture them.

"after the fact" is never the same.

So I will probably never get around to writing about these things, but in case Iain asks me someday, I want to remember...

Going back to the hospital where Dalton died and giving a gift to the nurse who cared for us.
Visiting Dalton's friends in Benicia and Petaluma and wondering why we never made the time to do it together.
Discovering that I did not die with Dalton on May 26, 2006.
Wishing sometimes that I had.
Lying down next to the grave of my husband.
And my mother.
And my father.
Getting to the gym five times in a week.
Going apple picking in Oak Glen
Having little Dalton give me a hug and say, "I miss you mommy Tricia. Daddy's in the hospital."
The dodgers winning the wild card and then throwing it away to the Mets.
Being up and down and all over the place in my thought, action, and dreams.

I am in counseling now. I spend $150 per hour for someone to listen to me perform my own psychoanalysis and occasionally ask an introspective question. She's very into dreams; believes they are truly gateways into our innermost psyche. That would be fabulous if I were someone who regularly remembered her dreams, but I'm not. Really, I never have been, but Iain kind of sealed the deal. How much of your dream are you really going to remember when the first thing you hear is a toddler screaming, "Out, mama. Out!" Nevertheless, I have assured Dr. D that I would place a notepad beside the bed just in case.

Just in case happened this week and of course, there was no notepad. I had two, yes two, dreams. The first was good. The second, not so good.

In the first dream, Dalton and I were having our usual fun, flirty, Saturday night at home. It was so real that I woke up thinking that I had finally been able to get through the nightmare about cancer and get back to real life. It happened at the end of a very rough day. Dr. D said it was compensatory, that I really needed it, so my inner self gave me what I needed.

In the second dream though, things were not so happy. There had been a murder, a stabbing, and Dalton and I were trying to solve it. Everything was either white or green-gray, like a scene out of Clockwork Orange. And here's the wierd part. Dalton was very distant. I was aware that he loved me, but that he was intentionally holding back. There was somethig he wouldn't tell me. Or couldn't help me with. And I felt alone. Very, very alone.

Dr. D's question to me was, "So which part of yourself do you feel has been murdered.?"

You're kidding, right.

All of me.

I have no clue who I am without this man. I don't even know who I want to be. It changes minute to minute. So most of the time I just am. And I really don't want to be someone who just is.

So I spend my time dwelling on who I should be. How can I fix this? What should I do? Where should I live? What should I study? How should I parent? What should I believe? When should I date? Who should I date? What cause should I devote my life to? Etc, etc.

It is tiresome, but so much easier than accepting my current circumstances. That is something that I cannot seem to do. And I continue to fight against.