my dear childhood friend G is in the hospital and it's bleak. we've known each other since we were tiny kids - 4 years old - back in Boston. when my father died, she flew home and stayed by my side. when I attempted suicide, she brought me to the hospital. she officiated my wedding. comforted me while I was in labor with little N. she shared my anger and fire as I divorced. but right now, she's barely here at all. incoherent. incapacitated. it's been 5 days of doctors struggling to diagnose and test and re-diagnose and re-test. a brain biopsy is next.
tonight i held her mother in my arms while she wept for her child.
someone kind told me that the energy of our friendship would carry us through this. the energy of me & G. of our history, I guess. the trajectory of our years of knowing and loving each other. oh, but tonight I have no energy. I am grieving someone who is still alive. and I'm exhausted.
there's no light at either end of this tunnel. no promise that if we continue, one unsteady foot after the other, that we'll get through to some better, sunlit place. there's only darkness here, and the fears the darkness hosts. each of us walks this treacherous path alone. her mother's path. her father's path. her husband. her older son. her younger son. and me. and tonight, there's no one coming to save us.
i don't know how to be faithful and grieving at the same time. I guess it's all in the showing up. it's in every trip to hospital. in every text and email. in every hug. god, it's so heavy and I'm so tired already.
i distract myself with a drink, a movie, scrolling through feeds. but when I'm finally home, and the tears start, it's relief. and it's true.
RSS Feed
