Dec. 19th, 2016 10:53 am
Post mortem
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muckefuckIt's hard to say how I'm feeling these days. I've been telling people that either I'm still deep in denial about ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
monshu's death or I've been preparing for this day for so long now that some of the work of grieving and moving on is already done. Over the past eight months, he was home for a scant three weeks, so it's not unusual that he's not there now. I'd built up a routine around living alone and it hasn't much altered except that without the daily trips to whatever stupid place he was staying I have a lot more time. But everyone wants to take me out for meals so I'm still eating out a lot (just not paying as much) and the cat's feeding schedule is still chaotic. And though I'm not actively managing his care day-to-day any more, there's still insurance nonsense to deal with and all the usual household administration to which has been added the bureaucratic machinery of processing a decease. So I'm as busy as always, just not with the same things.
I'm not numb; I still get pleasure from most of life. Yesterday I attended a friend's annual Christmas tea and collected my duty of hugs, then met up with another friend who showed me the delights of King Spa in Niles. I still cry a little every day, but generally only a little and only when I'm forcing myself by listening to a lugubrious post-punk ballad I know will produce a few tears. I curse the cat by day and cuddle him at night and people call me and I usually answer and sometimes I'm a dick to them but I try not to be.
One thing this is making clear is that my fear of rejection makes it difficult for me to ask for help. But my friends are need to feel they're helping me. So there's a lot of mutual benefit to be extracted from the situation if I can only figure out how to go about it. I'm trying.bunj is coming by tonight to pick up paperwork so he can file the will tomorrow, lhn is coming by Wednesday to sort out our computer files, and half the gay couple across the street is driving me down to St Louis on Thursday. But none of the food people kept offering to cook for us has materialised and I'm not going to ask; my friends aren't GrubHub. Besides, knowing me, I'd just end up tossing most of it anyway.
I was worried about being surrounded by associations but for right now they're comforting rather than distressing. I do get sad when I think about how much effort we put into building our household, i.e. all the decisions about furnishings, glassware, art--the whole trousseau necessary for living the good bourgeois life we'd been conditioned to expect. We worked so hard to make a harmonious whole but it feels like too much for a singleton to drag from apartment to apartment, so I'll have weeks of whittling to do (over the course of months, since it will be emotionally exhausting work). I have fantasies of stowing it all and going abroad for a few years which I'm sure will come to nothing; maybe there are adventures still awaiting me but I don't think that's one of them.
monshu's death or I've been preparing for this day for so long now that some of the work of grieving and moving on is already done. Over the past eight months, he was home for a scant three weeks, so it's not unusual that he's not there now. I'd built up a routine around living alone and it hasn't much altered except that without the daily trips to whatever stupid place he was staying I have a lot more time. But everyone wants to take me out for meals so I'm still eating out a lot (just not paying as much) and the cat's feeding schedule is still chaotic. And though I'm not actively managing his care day-to-day any more, there's still insurance nonsense to deal with and all the usual household administration to which has been added the bureaucratic machinery of processing a decease. So I'm as busy as always, just not with the same things.I'm not numb; I still get pleasure from most of life. Yesterday I attended a friend's annual Christmas tea and collected my duty of hugs, then met up with another friend who showed me the delights of King Spa in Niles. I still cry a little every day, but generally only a little and only when I'm forcing myself by listening to a lugubrious post-punk ballad I know will produce a few tears. I curse the cat by day and cuddle him at night and people call me and I usually answer and sometimes I'm a dick to them but I try not to be.
One thing this is making clear is that my fear of rejection makes it difficult for me to ask for help. But my friends are need to feel they're helping me. So there's a lot of mutual benefit to be extracted from the situation if I can only figure out how to go about it. I'm trying.
bunj is coming by tonight to pick up paperwork so he can file the will tomorrow, lhn is coming by Wednesday to sort out our computer files, and half the gay couple across the street is driving me down to St Louis on Thursday. But none of the food people kept offering to cook for us has materialised and I'm not going to ask; my friends aren't GrubHub. Besides, knowing me, I'd just end up tossing most of it anyway.I was worried about being surrounded by associations but for right now they're comforting rather than distressing. I do get sad when I think about how much effort we put into building our household, i.e. all the decisions about furnishings, glassware, art--the whole trousseau necessary for living the good bourgeois life we'd been conditioned to expect. We worked so hard to make a harmonious whole but it feels like too much for a singleton to drag from apartment to apartment, so I'll have weeks of whittling to do (over the course of months, since it will be emotionally exhausting work). I have fantasies of stowing it all and going abroad for a few years which I'm sure will come to nothing; maybe there are adventures still awaiting me but I don't think that's one of them.