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THIS IS US
What It’s Like Living in a Different Dimension
When my daughter died, I phased out of your reality
Part one: The many ways I’m separate
Sometimes I almost forget that I’m not in the same place as you. This took me a few years to master and (let’s face it) I can never truly forget that I’m in a different dimension. But after four years of faking it, I’m much better at pretending that I’m still like you.
I get work done, feed the cats, wrap Christmas presents, and convince myself that I’m in the same dimension as you are. But that only works until something reminds me that I’m not. And, trust me, there’s always something to pull me back to my own dimension.
Today it was a recording of her voice singing a song she’d loved. I sat with my hand on my laptop, feeling the computer vibrate and imagining the breath filling her lungs as she sang the familiar words. I tried not to cry. I always try not to cry. But the tears came because her lungs are gone. Her voice is gone. All I have are my few recordings and the deep desolation of her absence.
It’s always like that. A blink of clarity brings it all into focus and I realize (again) how far I’ve drifted from your dimension. My reality might be overlayed with yours or behind yours or possibly beside yours. But it inevitably becomes clear, one way or another, that I am not at all like you.
Part two: I am also invisible
My dimension is built from the DNA of grief. It’s a wild forest where I’m lost, forgotten, and abandoned. But it’s also a valley and a road and a quiet room that’s missing one very special little girl. Sometimes it’s a bird feeder filled with fresh seed. Sometimes it’s a Pixar movie watched quietly in bed, surreptitiously on my phone, with the warm blankets piled high, and the cat curled up at my feet.
My dimension is the only thing that makes sense when the rest of the world keeps pretending that we live forever and that working hard is somehow the answer to happiness and that only other people get old or sick.
My dimension is the only thing that makes sense when you pretend that the tragedy of a dead child isn’t…
