No More Balloons

Thursday was Justin's 24th birthday. I had spent the last few weeks with a growing anxiety. I had mentally circled the day in red ages ago. 


In years past, my mother has assembled some sort of hoopla to celebrate Justin. Two years ago we went out to the spot where we scattered his ashes and released balloons, then she cooked all of his favorite foods and we exchanged gifts. Last year my mother and I released balloons at the park where my brother played Little League. We followed that with dinner at his favorite restaurant and a dessert that was a childhood tradition. 


This year: nothing. No balloons. No birthday cake. Nothing.


No one even said a word about Justin. My sister had an appointment to get her hair thinned at 3:30 that afternoon.  BestFriend called me; she didn't remember that it was Justin's birthday. I couldn't force out the words to remind her.


I couldn't bring myself to say anything to anyone. In the days leading up to the 29th I hadn't mentioned it either. I wasn't sure how to approach it with my family; I didn't want to inflict it on my friends. I know that my friends would have been supportive. When I mentioned the significance of the date after the fact in that casual-but-not-really-casual way that I bring up tough things my friends were lovely and supportive and insisted that I should've told them. It wasn't that I didn't want to, exactly. I felt incapable of forming the words. And I didn't want to shine a light on my pain, or invite people to pity me. I didn't want to be viewed as seeking attention or sympathy. 


To be completely honest, I expected people to remember. Not my friends, but his friends, my family, all of the people who inserted themselves into my grief   when he died.


The worst part isn't that no one reached out to me. The sad, dark part of me always expects that. The worst part is that I feel as if everyone forgot Justin. All of the people who were his friends, who promised to love him forever are gone. It hasn't even been three years and he's already been forgotten. My grandmother didn't even call. 


By early afternoon, I couldn't take it anymore. I got into TheEgg and just drove. I ended up at the same sand dunes where we scattered Justin's ashes. I go there every so often to visit him. Not as much as I should. I sat there, wrapped in a beach towel and staring into the sea, until the wind dried all of my tears and my feet were numb. 


Days later, this is still bothering me. I feel so alone. How could they have all forgotten so soon?

Anniversary

Reverb11

Prompt for December 10: Anniversary: Tell us about an anniversary you marked in 2011; maybe one you noted for the first time.

I work with the public. In retail, actually. Black Friday (or the day after Thanksgiving) is busiest day of the year for retailers... and thus the bane of my professional existence.

It is also the bane of my personal existence. My brother died the day after Thanksgiving two yeas ago. Last year I took a week off of work and (due to cancelled-at-the-last-minute travel plans) spent much of that time sleeping and avoiding the world in general. I don't like to do something to honor my brother of this day. There are other days I prefer to honor, other days I prefer to remember.

This year, due to my promotion at work, I was obligated to spend the whole stupid Black weekend at work. With Christmas music. And crowds. And stupid Christmas music. I wasn't looking forward to it at all.

I was a walking wound. Over caffeinated. On edge. Under rested.

But I didn't want to make a big deal about it. I didn't mention the significance of teh day to anyone. Only one of my co-workers mentioned it to me at all. Interestingly, it was a coworker who didn't know me two yeas ago, had only heard me reference the date in passing months ago. It meant a lot to me that she even remembered.

And then, on Saturday, my boss and I had what began as a minor disagreement.

The image of what we must have looked like is laughable. Him: tall, Hispanic, gesturing wildly and booming. Me: shorter, pale and red-headed, frazzled, shrill. We nipped and snipped at each other like a Rottweiler and Pomeranian. I'm sure it was a ridiculous scene.


The disagreement ended with him yelling at me, quite loudly, in front of my staff and storming away.
In an equally unprofessional (and unsurprising) turn of events, I promptly burst into tears.


It was miserable. I don't relish a repeat of any part of the weekend. 

Live for Moments

Reverb11

Prompt for December 2:

Live for Moments: pick a vivid memory from this year- maybe one when you felt most alive; or when you felt most wounded, happiest, fulfilled. Tell us about it in the most vivid detail you can- sights, sounds, smells, feelings.

It was windy outside. The wind was crazy: whistling and whining and flinging things through the valley. I had struggled to keep my tiny EasterEgg on the road and was relieved to have made it to work safely.

I entered the building juggling my too-big purse and too-big Americano while trying to untangle my too-big sunglasses from my too-big hair. I could barely see through the red-blond cloud the wind had wrapped firmly around my face. My Americano had splashed over the lip of my cup and scalded an angry red blotch from the web of my hand past my wrist.

I set my coffee and my bag down on a counter and tried to shake it off- first the coffee on my arm, and then the I-blew-out-my-hair-with-a-cyclone look I was rocking.

My coworker, Tigerlilly, a particular favorite of mine, popped up out of nowhere. She grinned at me from underneath her inky black never-a-strand-out-of-place hair and said, "I'm glad you're here! I didn't know you would be in today!" I smiled at her as I tucked my sunglasses into my bag and gulped my coffee. "Your little brother just walked in, too!" she continued.

And, just like that, with a flash of her adult braces and a flip of her hair, I was devastated.

Every cliche about being metaphorically sucker punched happened in the next millisecond. My heart stopped. My breath stopped. Everything was quiet.

"What do you mean?" I forced the words out.

"You know, Lames. Your little brother." She was still smiling. A distant part of my brain realized she was making a joke about a coworker with whom I've become close friends.

I could see where the joke was coming from. He's a few years younger than me; we bicker like kids; we have silly inside jokes and nicknames.

I managed to hold on to my smile and say something flip in response- I have no idea what.

I walked away feeling nauseous, dizzy, breathless. The worst part? She had no idea that she'd just punched me in the throat.

The irony of Lames being the next person I encountered was not lost on me.

He drank my Americano and listened with sympathetic eyes as I told the story. It came rushing out in disjointed sentences and fragmented thoughts. I was sucking in deep choking gasps of air and fighting back the looming panic attack.

His silence was perfect.

"She didn't know" and "Its going to be okay" or any of those other things people say in situations like this one weren't what I needed. I knew that Tigerlilly didn't know.

I knew that she had no idea how much the loss of my brother still colored every day; that the pain festers and bubbles because I can't talk about it. Probably she had no idea that I have a dead brother at all. I also knew that it wasn't going to be okay. I'm never going to be okay with my brother's death. I'm never not going to feel the emptiness of the LittleBrother sized hole in my life.

This is the worst part of grieving- the unexpected reminders. I can steal myself for birthdays, holidays, specific places and people. But these reminders that pop up when least expected and sucker punch you? There is no way to prepare for them.