Hello, Friends,
You know that movie, Thelma and Louise, that was the way that this was supposed to happen. Like in the movie, Practical Magic, we were supposed to be two old biddies living in a house full of cats (okay, Brigid didn’t like cats so much) and we were going to die on the same day. We were going to be two crazy ladies on a mission of justice and empowerment that ended with us flying in a convertible off of a cliff. Either that or her Buick – either one!
I feel like I am standing on the edge of that cliff in a swirling cloud of dust that she has left behind. She flew away and I am still here.
Her mother is suing me over the final report on the estate. It is a back door move around the fact that Brigid had a “no contest” provision in her will. She is saying the most ridiculous things – like I spent too much for the funeral and on the funeral dinner. (Well – it was her family bellied up to the table!) It has been a constant assault, just when I thought this was over. We had a court hearing yesterday but the judge didn’t rule on anything. She wants me removed as executor/trustee and wants me to return any and all property – even the things Brigid left specifically to me. My attorney says I did great – but I don’t know. I just don’t know if this judge is going to buy this woman’s bullshit. She even said that, “The day after Brigid died, Joan ran out of the house yelling, Brigid left me 10,000 dollars!! YEAH!”
Well, if you have read this blog at all – or know who we are in real life – you know I have spent every day of the last 2 and 1/2 years trying really, really hard not to jump off that cliff that I am left standing on alone. I look at everything around me and I sometimes ask myself, “Is it even worth it anymore?” I know that leaving is not an option – that there are so many great things in my life. My family, my kids, my adorable grand-baby, Brigid’s adorable grand-babies. Brigid’s daughter. The promises I made that I am doing trying my hardest to keep! It is all so hard, though. I had to go over to the storage shed the other day and it is full of her things that are being kept for her oldest granddaughter. It still smells like her house and I just stand in the door and weep. This is supposed to get easier with time – but it doesn’t. People around me demand that I be who I was and I don’t even know where to find that person anymore. She doesn’t exist. I’m so tired all of the time.
I adore my husband, but this is hard on him, and he makes it harder on me. The house isn’t cleaned, the work isn’t done, I sit in the chair and stare at the TV. What he doesn’t see is me standing by the pictures of Brigid and I and crying – because I want to go back there. He is a good man and he loves me, but he wants to fix what is shattered. No one can fix this. I wrote this for him – but I can’t bring myself to give it to him.
What if I told you that you are not enough to fix my pain? That as much as I love you and I am grateful for you…you can’t replace her.
Would it help if I explained that if you had died and she had not…she would not have been enough to fix the pain of losing you. Would it help to know that losing you is my greatest fear?
What if what I have accomplished today is all I can do? Can you appreciate what was done and ignore what was left undone?
What if all I could do today was sustain life? If my only accomplishment was to get up and get through another day; can you honor that? Can you understand that I pushed through the sadness because I don’t want anyone to hurt like I hurt.
I am down the road. I am at the point where people say, “You need to move on.” What I cannot explain is that the absence of her has left a hole so large in me that the loneliness blows through it like wind through canyon walls.
Wounds become scars. The tears dry up. The things she left behind are settled. It doesn’t change the fact that she will never come through the door again.
I went to a Metaphysical Fair the other day and I did decide to do a reading. She nailed Brigid!! Down to the type of cigarettes she smoked and how she used to fling it around. I don’t know if the Psychic was that good or if Brigid is just that good – I put most of it on Brigid. She lets me (and unsuspecting people like my lawyer) know that she is still around. She told me that Brigid has heard me when I have yelled at her and that it is time that I start to forgive myself. She even told me that Brigid would be sending me someone special. These are things that I already knew. (I have my own abilities – but it is nice to get confirmation from someone else) They are things that make me weep. Yes – I need to forgive myself…I know that! Yes – I know that I will make a new friend…and it will be someone really, really special…but I didn’t want to hear that and I still don’t. Yes – I need to forgive Brigid – and I do forgive her and I don’t blame her – but there are so many times that I look around at something wonderful happening and think, “YOU SHOULD BE HERE!”
Now I am, once again, waiting for a judge to decide “justice.” Such a funny word. What is just, what is right, what is good. Personally, I would really like to see justice – just once! We don’t see much of that…do we? What little we may see we have to fight for even with out hands tied.
Even sitting here today writing “Brigid” feels so odd. I don’t want to call her that – I want to call her by her name. I can’t. We made a deal that this blog would be a place for people to find help…that we would be anonymous and they would be anonymous. I know that with every part of her she is telling me to step away from the “cliff” that I am staring at. I had come so far in coping with this before the court case came up…now it is like it is May 2016 all over again. The light was right there – I could almost grab it – the estate was nearly closed. Now it is gone again and some man who never met us will decide if I am “good enough” and if I have “done enough” to be the executor/trustee. Some man who doesn’t even know what Brigid’s mother did to her – the childhood of abuse. But, she is the grieving mother and once again…I am just some friend that manipulated the situation.
Please don’t worry – I am hanging in for now. I’m not planning on an “unscheduled dismount” of life. I’m just tired, sad, and alone…and there is no where that I can say that and there is no one I can say that to….except you.