Sadness

Three days now my inner being has been growing quiet. The first day, I noticed it, but ignored it...stayed distracted. Yesterday I was aware of it and it had an impact on my physical life, limited my activities, I began withdrawing and losing interest in the day. Finally went to the hospital and spent a short time with my uncle.

He has always been a giant in my eyes, as I remember often seeing him duck his head a bit to go through a doorway. I close my eyes and remember him working on a hay baler, or getting frustrated that one of the cousins was having trouble getting the hay trailer backed up into the barn so he jumped in the old red and white ford pickup and backed it right up..having left the drivers door open, the tractor parked next to the truck had no trouble using its large parked rear tire to rip the driver door off.
I remember the many times I would sit and watch him discuss his ranching business, or buy feed, or discuss with "90" his son different cattle and what needed done.

I remember him laughing. When Val and 90 and my brothers and I were all kids..after a long weekend of work on the ranch we'd be getting ready to "go to town" and I remember watching Val "style" his hair. Him not being much on primping or vanity, and being such a large man, he sat still as she gently brushed and styled his hair, and I could tell it delighted his soul.

They've disconnected all the life support stuff. His heart function is down to about 18. He knows he is surrounded by love but he can't respond. I kissed his cheek and told him that he was a very very great man and that I love him. I hugged Aunt KJ and told her I loved her. She said to me she knows she appears to be doing ok and being strong but that she was not. I told her I knew that, and that we all loved her and would be there for her and that somehow someway she was going to be able to be ok. (Though I've never seen such soul mates as her and my uncle and I really can't fathom her heart beating when his stops). Mom was there, being strong for them, but a part of her is dying too. A part of all of us is laying on that bed,
prying himself loose from the body that will go no more.

I didn't really know for sure why I was feeling so down, so sad, but I know now.
Sitting down to write out my thoughts, I see what they are of, and now with my eyes full of tears...I know why my inner being isn't well today. The phone will be ringing soon and I'll hear words spoken through tears that he has gone. I am thankful that I had a chance to hug him and tell him how much I love him and have always admired him. I told Aunt KJ that he is a very great great man..and I told him that too. Wish I had told him sooner, but I think he knew how I felt.

I don't like this.
I can't stop this.
I think about what Aunt KJ is going to go through when she goes back to that house that has always had him with her...how her whole life was just mixed together as part of his. I think about what mom said, that each time he's been in the hospital in the past my Aunt was so anxious just to get out of the hospital and go home, but not this time..she knows when she leaves the hospital this time, there is no "home".

I've been involved in grief counseling many times, many years. Long enough to know that I have no words of wisdom to make it all ok. Pain? Nah, its not pain, heartbreak heart ache, confusion, loss, complete shattering of our mental constructs, but the word "pain" just doesn't cover it, it isn't anywhere near strong enough to describe "absolute loss". For Aunt KJ this falls more into the "complete devastation" category.

I realize that I'm not dealing with it consciously...at least I haven't been until I sat down to write to try to understand what was going on inside me. I've shut down and gone into my "functional", "polite", "just a little tired" outward self. But a part of who I am, of who I care about, of who I count as "mine", is dying right now and it is tearing a great big hole in my heart and the reason I just keep distracting myself from it and blocking it out so much that I see that I'm sad and say hey..whats going on! Is because when I sit still and face this, I cry and I feel even worse than I did when I block it out.

So How are you doing today GerBeans? "Not great but I'm getting by, Are you having a busy day?"