Sweating
I picked the worst day to stay home sick. We don’t have air conditioning and it’s about 129 degrees and humid as hell. Sreakle keeps trying to snuggle with me and he’s making my fever worse and my room hotter.
Fever-induced dreams are always interesting. I’ve been laying in bed all morning, in and out of sleep and dreaming of the following: ice cubes, re-upholstering chairs, Carl Sagan, and conversations I had with my mom yesterday. My mom and I always have good talks. This Friday, her brother, my uncle Keven, is having a quiet little get together to mark the one year anniversary of his wife’s death. I just found out about this yesterday, and I was a bit uneasy when my mom told me the plan. My uncle is still devastated and weeps openly and easily at the mention of his wife’s name, Sharon. I know he wants to memorialize her life and death, and not just leave such an important day unmarked. However, I can’t help but think that it will do more harm than good, I feel like it will only depress him more. I can see my uncle having a hard time keeping it together at such a gathering, and maybe that is what he thinks he needs to try to heal. But, I don’t think he’ll ever heal. I think my uncle had that rare connection with a person where he actually did find his soulmate, and without her, will always and forever feel like he has no purpose living. They don’t have any kids together, so when he lost her, he lost big. It’s only been a year, but he’s told everyone that he will never love another woman again, that she was his person and he might as well die too.
I think we all search for that person in life. Some people really do find it, that person who becomes your purpose for living, and others just settle for someone. But what if what happens to my uncle happens to you? What if you do find your person, and they die, or leave you, and you’re left alone and miserable and incomplete for the rest of your existence? I’ve always believed in taking that risk, and that such a loss would be entirely worth it if you could just find that kind of love. But after seeing his immense sadness and feeling of worthlessness, I don’t know anymore.
