phantom pain

Extraordinary pain seems like a drug to me. All my senses are heightened, I feel and see everything more sharply. It's hard, but I also wonder how much of the world around me I've missed in the last 8 years because I was numbed by comfort. Smells and shapes and colors and details, the glow of a face or the highlights in shadows and the creases of smiles, every crunch under every footfall, the brightness and glare of every light are amplified by my saddness and complete aloneness. Sometimes I love the details and sometimes they are overwhelming and I can't stand them. I try to accept my aloneness and not be afraid of it. If I am not afraid of it, I am not afraid of anything.

Sometimes I still feel like we're together, like this is all a game or a show or a test. Or practice. Or I direct myself in a play I've made up in my head. I go about the business of being alone while telling myself, "And now, you will eat dinner alone. And now you will watch a movie alone. And now you will drive a long distance alone. Go to the beach. Stare out at the ocean. Yes. Tilt your head. Very romantic. You are a girl standing alone and looking wistful... A little more wistful. Yes. Maybe you should cry. Not too much. Just a little. Gooood."

I think this protects me a little bit from the harsh reality. I feel the way amputees must feel about their missing limbs. There are moments where I still feel like we're together, even though I know we're not. I have to remind myself what is real, and then suddenly I feel very very sad. So a lot of the time I romanticize it, in order to make it hurt less. I am Emily Dickinson, writing poetry and being lonely but dreamy. I guess we all have our outlets. Some take alcohol or rebound relationships or ice cream. I make myself the heroine in the movie version of my life. I stand on a hill and I wait for something. What, I don't know. But I know it will come, because that's what happens in the movie.