The last couple of weeks have been filled with lavish restlessness from my end. Muddled up emotions and bizarre dreams have busied and tired me. And I thought my weariness would be a good excuse for me to skip the rest of what I am supposed to face. But, no. My body is beat. But my mind and my heart continue to think, feel and carouse with each other.
I’ve always said that writing is my way of learning and unraveling more about my self. A deeper and closer look to whatever it is I am currently going through. A mirror…to reflect the things I am not really good at showing all on my own. A voice…to tell myself bluntly of the things I am too afraid, or too proud, or too ignorant to acknowledge and admit.
So here I am. Once more playing the examiner and the examinee at the same time…
More than once in the past week, I sat staring into the excel files in my computer, blinking back tears, trying to focus on the sheet that was in front of me. I didn’t let the tears fall. A firm voice in my head barked commands and reprimanded me to stop being so emotional. And so I’d take a sip of water, a couple of deep breaths and gulps, to steady my self and shake me from that persistent stupor of sadness. And then I’d whisper to my heart to go to sleep and feel nothing. Yet at the end of the day, when my body went limp from exhaustion and I succumbed to slumber, my heart made images that were so vivid, I wouldn’t be able to escape the truth from them.
I dreamt of fighting demons. I dreamt of shouting at someone and breaking something. I dreamt of something that left me feeling weird when I woke up the next day. I dreamt of something that must have been extremely sad, because I had tears streaking my face when I woke up. I guess I fooled myself into thinking that if I don’t cry during the day, in my waking hours, it automatically means I wouldn’t be shedding a single tear drop in my sleep as well.
What was I so scared of? Looking foolish crying in front of my computer? I’ve done that a number of times before and so have others (this is not an easy business we’re into). Getting tear stains into my clothes? Most of them have tear stains already as souvenirs from all the quarrels and arguments I’ve had with myself and with others. Ending up with swollen eyes the next day and looking, well, not-so-good? I have shown up worse at the office.
Or was I scared of admitting that after all this time, I did love him after all…and that having lost him hurts…really, really bad. And that I know it doesn’t make sense to miss something you barely even had, but when I lost him to death, I knew that as much as there was already a limitless and vast number of things, occasions, and memories we lost from each other and that I should be used to all of it by now, I would still miss him forever.
And was I so terrified to acknowledge, that lately I’ve been looking at mirrors more often, because I see him when I stare at my face. And when I look at myself it seems like I’m looking at him, remembering how he was back when he was full of energy…back when he was alive. Maybe I’d remember. Maybe I’d be able to keep his smiling face in my memory… A desperate attempt to secure a good recollection of him, because it was many, many years ago when I last saw him this way. And a frantic stab at trying to erase the memory of his lifelessness the last time I saw him breathing. Breathing but lifeless.
In the last ten years, having him as my father almost seemed just a biological thing. But looking back now, I know it was more than that. After all, he is still the only man I have ever called Daddy. And he is still the only guy I was ever a Daddy’s Girl to.
And after shuffling and re-shuffling all the complications of our situation…after counting the many times someone was hurt because of how dysfunctional things were…after contemplating how long it really has been since I last spoke to him, and I can’t even remember when exactly that was… After debating and arguing with myself whether things should be easier because we didn’t really spend much time with each other or things would be harder because he was taken from me before we could even have our second chance together…
I realize…what does it matter?
When I’ve lost him now forever.
And no matter how many tears I cry, no matter how many crazily intense dreams I dream, no matter how many times I look at myself in the mirror…
He’s not coming back.
He’s never coming back. =(
-To my Daddy...I finally mustered enough strength to put it into paper. It has never been easy. But this is the hardest yet. Love, Paupau.
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