A Picture of Pain

I’m feeling pain today. I lost my Dad and it hurts. I feel the loss of what was and what is. A new existence. I am without. It hurts to be without. My earthly father is gone and I can’t get him back in this lifetime. I know there is more to this feeling of pain, but I can’t completely articulate what it is. I’d like to ignore it and say “everything is “fine,” but truthfully, everything is not fine, despite the fact that the world keeps turning, the sun is still setting and “life goes on.” It feels like it should stop and we should be allowed to be in our pain, with life on hold while we get through our pain. That’s not how it is.

I feel pain darting around inside me, fighting to get out, to be free. It feels funny. No, that’s not true. It hurts and there is nothing funny about that. I try to put a picture to the pain and all I see are squiggly lines. Lines that go everywhere and nowhere. They are in a circles and ovals and weird, meaningless
shapes. They go up and they go down. They go all around in a big mess of crazy, letting-go lines. It feels good to let these lines go where they may.

I begin to find words. I write the words inside some of the messy, going-no-where-in-particular lines and pain comes out of my pen:

Sadness
Rejection
Loss
Loneliness
Shame
Fear
Worry
Isolation
Hurt
Confusion
Uncovered
Exposed
Raw
Messy
The Unknown
Frightening

I’m going to leave my pain here. Leaving it here allows it to be free and now, its outside of me.