On Prolonged Silence

I suppose the easiest way to explain these months of blogger silence is to say that I simply haven't known what to write. And for that reason, I've chosen to avoid the issue entirely. It's not that I have been suffering from so-called writer's block. More aptly, I have been overwhelmed by thoughts to the extent that each time I think I have clarity on a particular topic, I am immediately aware that I'm actually entirely conflicted. Even the issue of whether or not to blog has been vexing me these days. On the one hand, it is a useful journal for me and others who share this odd circumstance. On the other, it has begun to feel a bit limiting. I think that my life might be outgrowing it and I haven't determined whether it has a place in this fuller life. It began as a way of keeping people up to date on Dalton's journey with cancer, became a sort of memoir of my own struggle, and since his death has been more of a recording of the process of grief.

But now what?

I am certainly still very deep in grief. I react to life in ways peculiar to those who have experienced tremendous loss. Guarded. Contemplative. Disconnected. Distant. Reckless. Unfettered. However, these things are no longer violent waves of feeling that thrash me about and make it impossible for me to think of anything else. They are more like an undercurrent, and life goes on despite them. Writing about the undercurrent and ignoring the rest of the tide is an unfair description of my life. And, frankly, it isn't very interesting. So, I am faced with the dilemna of continuing to write a boring blog focused primarly on the steadiness of grief OR expand into areas of my life that are more mundane and risk being another one of the milions of bloggers who think that their daily life is intriguing in any way.

I just don't know.

So much has happened since I last posted. I went on my first date (a disaster that will make a great short story one day). I sold my West Covina house. I took a vacation to England and France. And through it all, I greived. Grieving really isn't anything special or dramatic anymore. It's just is. Since I am by nature an upbeat, positive person, the subleties of my grieving are hard to spot. But I know where they live. They live in my inability to get excited by anything, passionate about anything. They invade the space in my mind and heart where ambition, purpose, and excitement normally reisde. For me, that is the cruelest part of the process, the feeling of floating without any direction or anyplace to float toward.

I keep asking God for relief, for direction. The only answer I kep getting is "Be patient." But the world around me isn't patient. People want to know what I do. What I hope for. What I am working toward.

I have no idea.

I simply worry about today.

And really, that is probably a healthly way to live, because today is all we have. But it isn't very acceptable, it isn't very respected, and it certainly isn't understood. I can't say that I am all that comfortable with it myself, but the one thing I am sure of is that forcing the issue is a bad idea. Faking it till I make it would be disastrous.

I am thinking about writing more consistently and trying my hand at a novel, but I'm still on the fence about that as well. Who knows? In the meantime, I'll just go on reading the Match ads and wondering if I should rule out a potential date because he capitalized Novel. Dalton would never do that. And Dalton is who I want.