Flatline

I moved over to wordpress since this place feels like a graveyard I don't care to visit at the moment. Trust me, things aren't any better over there. But, there's drinking until I find sleep, then new nightmares. Sometimes, there's even beautiful dreams...

Those are worse than any purgatory.

God

What I love the most is being systematically put to death.

All I can do is look at it leave my soul.

God help me I can't go on.

My Orange

You are the orange.

http://youtu.be/cwynKGNRqTE

I am the puppy.

Sigh

Some days are ok.

Others are not.

Today I feel my heart collapsing onto itself.

I hope I cease to exist soon.

That way everyone can be free.

Nieve

I was 18. 

It was December, 2002. Mom was horribly sick, again. But this time Dad wasn't around to take her to the hospital or help take care of her. No one knew what was wrong, except she had terrible pain in her side (which, as of today, we now know was lymphoma spreading to her lungs) and anything she ate made her sick. 

I had a 1992 Ford Probe. My first car. I had just started a job with a chiropractor, as the only other person in the office besides the doctor. I did the reception, registration, insurance filing, billing, collections, dusting, cleaning, fixing the copier, IT support, snow shoveling and picking up his meals...etc. I went got to work at 7:45 a.m. and left at 5:30 p.m., ran home and changed, then went to my second job as a part-time clerk at an FYE Music. My second job was from 6:30 p.m. until about 10:00 p.m. I made $250 a week in my full time one and $75 a week in my part time. I never had a day off. 

Mom was sick. I was alone. My biggest regret, was having to run in for 15 minutes between jobs into her hospital room and finding her all alone in a country with no family. My dad's family had shunned us, blaming her...me...for my parents' divorce. My dad's sister had been best friends with my mom for over 20 years, and there she was, just 7 blocks away from the hospital and refusing to stay with my mother or even visit. I'd run into her room and she hadn't been bathed or the bed sheets hadn't been changed. I'd do it real quick, help her bathe and apologize over and over for having to run. She'd just smile sadly and wave as I ran out. My last image was of her staring out the big window out into the blowing snow.

I was 18, and I drove by the Ivy League, all-girls university I had been accepted into during my senior year of HS on the way to work every morning. I couldn't afford it, in time or money. I would've been on my way to some beginner's Art class at 7:30 a.m., not on my way to unlock a moldy office to rub mentholated gel on Mrs. Hirkach's very dirty neck for 15 minutes, until my fingers locked up and hurt with mild arthritis. Yet, my regret was still...still...being at work while my mother laid up in a hospital room by herself trying to ask for help in her broken English or struggling to make sense of what the doctors were saying without an interpreter. 

I am 28. Snow is blowing. Mom's sick, again. This time I don't think I will get another chance to make it right by her. So I have to make it count. I don't want to regret a thing. 

One day at a time. 

Bye.

"The sweeping up the heart,
And putting love away
We shall not want to use again
Until eternity."

The year is over. Then again it has been for a while.

I hear the muffled sounds of fireworks and laughter coming from outside.

I just threw up the only solid food of the day, and the nausea is overwhelming. And the night is not even near over yet. 9:30 p.m.

I feel deleted from everything. I am nothing. I am no one. Am I even real?

...

What else. I'm dead, yet still somehow living.

I curled up in the shower today, because that's the only way my body could cope with the violent crying and the gasping for air. Somehow I was holding myself against a wall and hot water beating my back as I sobbed against a wall.

I'm dead, yet, somehow I feel every single ounce of everything in my soul. I have nothing to left to say. Nothing that doesn't involve begging and clinging to you like salvation from this purgatory.

I'll start over tomorrow. I'm sorry I am weak. I am sorry I'm not normal. I'm sorry for everything under the sun and moon.

In this part of the story...

I'm here again.

Mom has lymphoma. Prognosis isn't good. Maybe on Thursday they'll tell her a bone marrow transplant could help. Maybe I'll be a match. Probably not. Even if I were, my own body is shutting down. 

They say man can survive pretty much anything, except the loss of hope. I seldom eat nowadays. If I sleep, the fresh set of nightmares ensure I'm back up in a few hours. 

I'm on Prozac now. Lexapro never worked well. Pristiq didn't work at all. So I'm a Prozac human now. I wish I didn't feel the shame I do, admitting that I'm on that medication. But it's like I can feel others...especially those who I thought loved me unconditionally...looking down at me as if thinking "You're just not trying hard enough to be happy. To move on. To put your 'big girl panties on'. I am human. Maybe I'm not as strong as some of you fancy yourselves to be. Or maybe I choose to acknowledge my shortcomings. To accept my weaknesses. To admit I feel. It was between throwing up all day and night, out of anxiety and staring at a belt in the closet for hours on end...just thinking about how ready I was to tighten it around my neck...OR...seeking help. 

I am sad. I was happy. As happy as anyone can be in a fucked up world with complicated situations to go through. But at least I had something to look forward to in the morning. Something that challenged me to be better, to do better, to take care of myself. A light at the end of the tunnel. Because there's a difference in fighting to stay alive...so that you can enjoy your reward of utter happiness, completeness at the end...and the fight to stay alive so that you can achieve the mediocre life that's ok by everyone else's standards but yours. 

I am sad. But I still get up every morning...and for the first 5 or 10 seconds, I am still groggy enough to not realize what my life is now. So I relish that slight haze of happiness I feel. I am sad, but maybe one day I won't be. Or maybe one day I'll run out of tears. One day I won't wince. I won't hurt. I won't long. I won't be Yari. I pray for the day I am able to not be me anymore. Because at least I'll be able to act okay for the sake of everyone. I'll be the rock everyone leans on again. Quiet. Listening. Offering whatever's left of my heart in advice or caring for family and friends. Maybe I won't feel like half my chest has been ripped away forever. Or at least I'll hide it well. 

But, for now, I am sad. I am very lonely. I miss my best friend, more than anything else. I miss being loved, needed, wanted. I miss smiling. I miss not crying out of nowhere, over nothing. I'll continue to eat whatever I can hold down. I'll continue my medicine. I'll continue working. I'll above all continue trying to make my Mom comfortable and as happy as I can. I'll continue waiting for another sunrise, and maybe that one will make things bearable. Tolerable. I'll read. I'll write. I'll paint. I'll cook. I'll stare at the ceiling. I'll stare vacantly out a window (and yes, my thought will be on you). I'll cry when I feel like it. I'll get back up any time I crumble to pieces. I'll pray the Universe has some sort of pity on me and at least gives me the best friend that loved me and was happy to talk to me back. Because I need that more than anything right now in order to survive the loss of all else I held close to my heart. The way you hold a newborn that just fell asleep after hours of crying. The way you look at him sleep, wondering how he will look like, what his voice will sound like when he learns to talk, imagining his moments in life, wondering how and who he will grow to be. My dearest things are gone. So while I build myself up and patch up the gaping void, I need a hand. A hug. A kiss. A smile. 

I will continue existing. For my Mother. I owe her that much. I'd be a coward to leave her like this. I will continue. Hope is a foreign concept. Which is why I say I'm merely continuing. Not living. Simply, existing. There is no Yari.

Baby It's Cold Outside

Saturday.

Forced myself out of bed.

Forced myself to dress in something other than pajamas.

Forced myself out the door.

The sky was beautiful. The day was beautiful. Wince.

Sat down to eat my first meal other than saltines or soup in a week. Baby It's Cold Outside came on.

Pain. Pain. Pain. Holidays. Pain. Nothing. Pain. Three bites of food. Nausea. Tears. Pushed plate away. Went back to apt.

Back in bed. Still dressed. Stillness.

http://youtu.be/FTNheCEUP_A

Don't Go

Mom,

You're standing behind me drying my hair, as we watch a tv show about dream weddings for people who've had what you call "taste for champagne but a Coca Cola salary." You say, jokingly, that all you remember of my wedding day is my few words and the tears that wouldn't stop as I sat in my room all dressed up, in the dark. I try to laugh...but only a small, dry chuckle comes out with a quiet "heh. Yeah."

Tears have been quietly streaming down my face for about 30 minutes now and you finally noticed, as you brushed hair out of my face. You kissed my forehead and you just look at me waiting for me to tell you why I'm so sad. But, how can I tell you what's wrong? That my heart is completely broken by the past and the present. You're my mom. You've been my best and sometimes my only friend. How many more moments like this do we have left? How can I tell you I'm slowly but steadily losing my dreams...my happiness...my life? Why should I put my sadness on your shoulders when you need me to smile and pretend I'm happy and ok and strong? You want nothing more than to believe I have a happily ever after in store for me in the future. That's what would make you have a good night's sleep. To know your daughter is loved and happy and not alone. That she's just emotional because the dream wedding show is demonstrating that good things happen to good people.

I can't make the tears stop now. And the silence is growing uneasy. So here I go hiding my face in my phone until I can regain composure. Because all I can tell you is that my heart hurts like I've never felt it hurt before...and we've been through some tough crap...yet nothing us killing my soul like this. All I can tell say is that I am afraid of losing you soon and I'm devastated if I lose my heart for good. That I'm standing in the middle of a room asking the different people that make up my heart "Please, don't go?"...but, all I really am becoming is just something forgettable...part of the background. Invisible. Mute. Nothing.

Please. Don't go.