The Beast

Today I was ambling around in the grocery store, trying to get the bulk of what we need on the small amount of money I had. But I was stopped dead in my tracks. I thought for a moment that my shopping excursion might come to sudden halt. Maybe I should just stop and walk away. Or stop and pull over. Or... I don't really know. But I was struck with an intense sense of missing my Dad and wondering how I will go on now that he's gone. And I almost teared up and bawled in the store. Right frickin' there in the store, walking from the flour aisle to the milk shelves.

I'm sure it happens. Because grief is a strange beast. It is always with me and yet sometimes I am functional and sometimes it washes over me like I've never felt it before. I don't think this is unique to me. I think it is probably a natural part of the process. Except that I believe that in grief perhaps there is no process. Like a sullen, spoiled child, it just does it wants, when it wants, wreaking havoc on those it comes in contact with, leaving them in chaos and despair. We are victims of her heartlessness.

Oh Daddy, if only you were here to help me navigate this. This hollow, empty place. That slaps me upside the head in the grocery store, leaving me reeling and nearly succumbing to the tears. Dad, this grief is suffocating today. I can't believe you left me. I'm sad, I'm flustered. I'm disbelieving. I needed you, and left me. I feel guilty letting that thought go from head to my typing fingertips. I know you didn't leave by choice. I know you knew how devastated we would be. You had some insane sense of the depth of our need for your wisdom, your intuition, your skills.

But moreover, our need of your determination, your unfailing love, your father's heart. This is what I cannot seem to navigate my world without.

Tomorrow may be warmer, sunnier, in my soul. But today I will allow the blackness of my grief to wash over me and leave me out in the cold. Though I know I always have a choice, today it feels as if I have no choice.