I suppose it’s a sign of growth that I barely ever write these things any more, though I do feel that I’m letting Colin down by not keeping this up. There was a time when I was going to become active in the grieving community and man workshops that helped other grievers come through to the other side. Instead, five years out, I’m barely keeping his blog running. Mostly it just accumulates impressive spam.
Then again, I’m visiting his grave almost every week and reading to him, so perhaps I’m just finding ways to keep things going, just not so publicly. That’s probably also healthy. Plus, now that we’re finished with the first Hardy Boys story, we’re now trying the first Nancy Drew story, mostly because I couldn’t find the book I actually wanted to read in the wreckage of Emma’s bedroom.
What’s really on my mind is that it’s been almost five years. Yes – on September 17, it will be five years without him.
That seems like something that should be noted. Plus, because of the way fate works, it will be the first time I’ve marked an anniversary of his death alone. I mean, not alone alone. The kids will be here. So will Murphy. But Christina left for her cancer rehab this week and is not due back for a few weeks. I don’t begrudge her any of it. She needs the rehab, both physically and mentally, and this was the best time to do it, given the vacations we want to take this year. But the fact remains that I will be the only parent here when September 17 rolls around this year and I’m not quite sure what to do with it. Christina has always been the one who takes care of the grave. Yes, I show up and read to him once a week, but there’s some block that keeps me from doing much of the actual tending. It took me years to come to terms with the grave’s existence. Being asked to keep plants growing where my son is dead is too much of a jump on some levels.
I went to the men’s group at the hospice last week for the first time in months and mentioned my solo Death Day plans. One of the guys pointed out that this Death Day would mean Colin had been dead as many years as he had been alive. I couldn’t work up much more than a “huh” to that, because I had truly never thought of it that way. Then again, he said some relative had calculated that his dead child had lived 1,111 days, so maybe they’re just a numbers-focused family.
Of course, if you do the numbers right, Colin was five years, seven months and 13 days old when he died, so I suppose we don’t get to the halfway point properly until April 30 next year, but that gets too complicated to think about. I try not to think about details like that, because I’ve found life comes up and whacks you with memories whether you like them or not. I read once about the wisdom of focusing too much on trigger warnings because, well, isn’t everything a potential trigger warning? I mean, yesterday I saw an empty kids’ swing in a yard and that was enough to prompt a flood of memories for me. So, I guess I’d have to agree. Why bother trying to avoid triggers if anything is a potential trigger?
And I guess that’s what September 17 is now. It’s just another trigger. But at least not every trigger prompts a blog entry from me any more. I roll with it. I even enjoy the memories of the good times sometimes. Emma recently told me that she barely has any memories of 2019, and I do get that. But I do remember from time to time that we managed to keep something like a family life going through all of the awful things that accompanied 2018-19. And maybe that’s what I need to be focused on remembering.
So, September 17 will come. And then April 30 will come. And they’ll keep coming. And I’ll keep reading stories to him and, I suppose, one day I’ll write the last blog entry that will appear here. But I don’t think that’s today.