These days I do not dwell too much anymore on what it would
be like if she is still with me. Because I have been slam-dunked into this new
reality where she is not a physical part of anymore. She is now but traces of a
memory. A visage that my confused mind with its high propensity for self-delusion,
keep planting everywhere. Especially so when I am at home. I “see” her – reclining
against her favourite sofa, brushing past me as I mount the stairs or lying
still beside me on my now awkwardly oversized bed.
But the trickery of these awful mind-games betray its transcendence.
They remind me instead that she is gone for good.
So I wake up each day, muttering to myself. Make the best of
the new day. Live the day for her. Because she wanted so much to live on,
though alas, could not.
It is now routine. I have truly accepted her passing on.
Like it or not, this new world is now the “new normal” for me. Empty and flat
as it may feel.
I am also mindful that it has been a rather long hiatus
since my last posting. An explanation might be in order. It may seem like my
writing has fallen off a cliff of sorts.
I could offer excuses. After all, the “new normal” has seen
more of my time packed with all kinds of activities, sometimes leaving me all
bushed out. I had spent more of my free time outdoors, seeking out new jogging
trails, trekking up and down Bukit Timah hill, which pathetically, at 160m is
the tallest hill feature in our small island state and keeping myself as trim
and fit as my strained sinews and withering body would permit. I received frequent
invites for badminton meet-ups, open mic jamming sessions on Friday nights and
dinner meetings with old colleagues.
But what kept my fingers from hitting the keyboard was
neither fatigue nor lack of time. I was seriously having second thoughts of
penning my emotive state.
Not since I started the blog to chronicle at least in parts
my journey of grief, have I ever been so rattled with self-doubt. I had long
hard thoughts. What was I trying to
prove? Are my postings at all helpful to the bereaved? To inspire them to rise
above the rut? Fat chance on that. To the non-bereaved, I might have written
enough to garner some sympathy but woe would be me, if pity was the object of
my effort.
The entire writing endeavour was meant to be a form of
catharsis, to release and re-channel my inner pain. But the words of CS Lewis rang
again inside my head - "Aren't all these notes the senseless writings of a man who won't accept the fact that there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it?"
So my writing hit a wall. I came close to deserting my
journal.
But like a faithful old friend, this old site came calling
me back. I would never have the heart to close it down. The words might run dry
and some day it probably would, but what little I have after my terrible loss,
I will hold fast to. Along with the grief I am now left with. Because grief is
the product of my love for her. And my love for her does not change with her
passing. My lovely Jenny whom I will always hold dear in my heart.
So this is what acceptance means. I will spend the better
part of each day getting the chores done. In the office, decisions on this and
that. Issues to resolve, glitches to smoothen out, bruises to balm and knots to
unstitch. After years of toil and toll, there is little I have not encountered
in the education scene that I cannot say “been there, done that”. Or at
home, mail to sort out, food supplies to stock up on, a cat to pat and feed.
But now for these last 335 days since she had left me, there
is but one constant. Busy or exciting the day may have unfolded, I return each
night to a life without her. And that
feeling of hollowness and emptiness. I feel weak, afraid, lost and lonely. Accept her non-existence completely and
totally. But those feelings are always there. A constant companion.
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