Dazed days

Strip the years of days where sickness, death and other forms of human tragedy made their way into our lives, take stock of what remains and pick the day, okay two days that you’d like to reward with the label of the hardest to get through and I’ll give you today and tomorrow

(Forgive me, but aren't you indulging yourself here with heavy doses of unnecessary drama?
Nope.)

For months I knew they were coming – the last day within, and the first day without.

Each morning I had been taking apart bits and pieces of the structure we created for ourselves for decades (house and not house related) and now I am left with just the core. And there is no pulling back – the core has to be dismantled.

(It takes more than a day to dismantle a core. You've been chipping away at it for years.
Thanks, you're too kind.)

There are people who have done this under similar circumstances and lived to tell stories, punctuating memories with a smile even. All I can say is that they are either tougher, angrier, or more indifferent than I am.

There are times when my grittiness pushes me forward with a steady pace while others around me topple. I am used to facing change, to switching gears, I am used to starting from the beginning, scrambling to find alternatives when current realities are unpalatable.

(I know, I know! Hearty Polish Peasant Stock!
Did I ever mention the Polish peasant from the village where I lived? You know, the one who started each morning with a pint of vodka, wound up in the ditch by noon and had to be force-fed because he seemed not capable of getting it enough together even to put food in his mouth? Just thought I'd mention how gloriously diversified that stock of peasants really is.)

But I am not used to being the one who has to take apart the final pieces of a life-long project and waking up the next day to find only a pile of debris, all semblance of the structure gone. Everything in a state of disarray.

So, hello Monday, hello Tuesday. I knew you’d get here soon enough. Puffy eyes complementing Slavic puffy cheeks, torn jeans, raggy t-shirt -- I feel like I ought to post a picture here, except there may be new students reading Ocean. One doesn't want to give the appearance of being too discombobulated at the beginning of the semester.