I cried pretty hard tonight. The trigger? Tossing a piece of board on my outdoor fire.
As I've moved on to installing insulation in the shop's ceiling, I've been burning the scraps from all of the roughsawn board-and-batten siding while I'm out there working. Tonight, all was going fine. I tossed on a piece of scrap... all in an instant, memories started flooding in (and I mean flooding), beginning with our frequent fires on the patio.
We'd have bread and cheese, maybe a bottle of wine, and just sit and talk... looking out at the trees until the sun went down.
Memories surged through my mind's eye... Patio fires; motorcycle rides; lighthouses; cooking together; harbors; hikes; embracing; finding her crushed body; her helping me hoist the shop rafters up; skiing; road tripping; "you will never have experiences with her again."... unrelenting for many minutes.
As I thought the sobbing was subsiding, I told myself "just finish the last two insulation batts." I went to move the table saw out of the ladder's way; on it was the hammer she had gifted me almost 5 years ago as I built my tiny house. Broke down again. Called it a night.
I do think there's a balance in grief. I feel that it's not healthy to sit depressed for days on end; Nor is it healthy to continually distract to try to keep the emotions at bay. I WANT to sit with it. Let it in, so that I can process it. Every experience that I had with her that I will now have without her, will need it's own process. So I need to let it.
I think that perhaps I fell out of balance the past couple of weeks. Sure, there are always our pleasant memories and short weeps here and there; but obsessed and utterly filling my mind with this workshop and boat project... finally, what had to well up, did. Good.
Man did I love her. Have you ever been out-of-your-mind in love? I wish it for everyone. And may they never have to lose theirs.
Anyway... Power and insulation! Dug, laid the wire, and backfilled a 76' x 18" trench last Saturday for the cable; surprisingly didn't ache too much the next day.
