Break me

LI

Hey mom, how you been?   What's new?  Not much?  Yeah, me too.  Do you miss me?  Because I miss you.

I realize how different I am from last year when I reread some of my favorite books.  And they're still my favorite books, but they don't reach me the same way they used to.  I remember my favorite parts because I read them so many times, but they don't give me chills the way they used to.  They're just words that I like.

I reread things I have written recently, and they sound different too.  They sound like they are written by a completely different person.  

WE ARE DIFFERENT, as time goes on WE SUBTLY CHANGE

I'm sure you are changing too.  Your body has probably decomposed more this year.  It probably doesn't smell as bad as it used to.  Maybe the bones are now falling apart.

I apologize.  I realize how evil I sound, talking about my own mom's dead body like that.  It's not that I hate my mom, even if I sound like it, I don't.

Truth is, I do not like dead people.

Before my mom's, I had only attended three other funerals.  The first was for my mom's aunt Frida.  I was probably like six at the time and had never met the woman.  The next was my great grandpa's.  I was probably seven then, and the only thing I remember about that was me throwing up at the reception afterwards.  And then there was my mom's aunt Geraldeen's funeral. I was kept in the nursery for the whole thing then.

So my mom was probably the first dead person I ever touched.  Maybe even the first dead person I ever saw.  I mean, I'm sure I've seen more than one dead person in my whole existence, but she was the first real dead person.  The first corpse I saw and realized wow, I'm never going to see her alive again she's gone.

I had been in cemeteries before.  But it had never actually occurred to me that this is where my mom is going to be living forever.  I hadn't realized that the only thing left, marking her existence, was a piece of rock with her name on it.

So I don't like dead people.   I don't like thinking about them.  I don't like being near them.  And I definitely do not like touching them.  That was horrible.  Note to self: if you ever see another dead person, do not touch them.   Because we are all different, as time goes on, we subtly change                   (or not so subtly)