Here We Go A Wassailing

So today (Friday) I went to an Advent Carol service being put on by the Anglican chapel I normally go to. It was really, really pretty, with candles and readings and singing. But I was having a really, really bad day. I skipped saying the Rosary this morning, so I lost that little bubble that I usually have, and it just went downhill from there.

I had really been hoping to hear from someone, because I wanted to see them, so I was a bit disappointed about that. When I got to my carrel, all my books had been moved (again), and I had to wait for the girl using my desk to come back from God knows where so she could move her stuff. And I was tired and, due to exertion-induced asthma, couldn’t really breathe and needed to get my wind back, for which sitting is helpful.

Then, my kidneys etc. were doing that thing again where they don’t function properly. So that was frustrating as well as worrying, since I thought I’d gotten a handle on that. In any event, it causes a good amount of pain, so that didn’t make me cheerful. My meds were making it impossible to eat, so I was dizzy and lightheaded but couldn’t eat anything without getting nauseous. I skipped Advent devotions and evening prayer, which I’m sure was a bad idea. Coming home so late, I’ve also missed Compline. So I’m out a good, oh, two hours of prayer. That always makes me a bit cranky. I wrote a draft of a letter requesting medical leave – a concept which is itself worrying and stressful, ironically – but didn’t get a response to that, either. Also, I’ve had a constant headache since Wednesday. Ugh. I haven’t been sleeping and so I’m exhausted.

Anyway, so I go to this service and only actually know one song, which made me feel like a bit of an outsider, especially having spent the last few days with people singing songs I know. Holding the candle made me think of J---, God † rest his soul, who I was always afraid was going to light his music on fire during the Vigil. I’ve been missing him a lot lately: singing songs we had parts to together, expecting to hear his voice in my ear and sometimes almost hearing it.

I guess I was in a bit of a nostalgic mood. I also thought about B---, God † rest her soul, that time driving back from St. Mary’s hospital when my mother and S--- convinced her that Styrofoam grew on trees, and I was trying not to laugh. Or was it plastic bags?...What it felt like when she didn’t sit next to me in choir anymore. About S---, God † rest her soul, who sometimes drove me home from choir, and how much I cried at her funeral. About B---, God † rest his soul, whose funeral I altar served at and then cried later, realizing how much I never knew. About T---, God † rest his soul, and the first Christmas that he was sick. About my grandfather, God † rest his soul, where there was never any service and they wouldn’t let us into the hospital room to see him when he was dying. About P--- and R--- and K--- and R---, God † rest their souls. About Fr. S---, God † rest his soul, whose CBW I hymnbook I just got. About my friends and family who are dying. Most of all, I thought about Father, God † rest his soul; I got a Bible that belonged to him, and now I carry it with me.

I’ve been surrounded by so much recent grieving this last while, but I haven’t had the opportunity to share my stories with anyone, to have anyone hold me while I cry, to have anyone willing to be there in all my sorrow. I’ve been trying to be that person, the person I don’t have and have never had, and it’s at the point where I’m not sure I can deal with this all alone anymore. At any rate, I don’t want to, but there seems to be nowhere to go.

Add to this the fact that I already kind of dread Christmas – the year I was really sick, some horrible things happened and were said in the family that kind of tainted it forever for me – and you have a mixture of everything that’s fucked up about me, and it’s really volatile.

So I leave after the service and go sit in my little alcove, where, of course, I cry. Some really cool friends saw me and came and made me laugh, and I felt a bit better. But I had been bursting into tears all day. I was afraid to go to the thing they had afterward because, well, it’s humiliating to cry in front of people, especially when they have no idea why it’s happening. I was also really embarrassed to see the person I had wanted to meet, because I think it’s not really fair for me to ask, again, for someone to help me out by listening. I mean, really Kat, get a life. I’m sure everyone now thinks I’m even weirder than they thought before, but I’m not sure I actually care. Better to seem like some sort of social phobic person than some sort of crazy freak who keeps crying. That’s my theory, anyway. I am grateful I was able to make it through the skit part, which is what I really wanted to see.

Going back toward the train, I had to keep stopping to cry. I thought about jumping in front of the Metro, but then I realized that that’s stupid. Having been in the position where I’ve almost died, waking up in the ICU freezing cold with monitors and IV’s and various other medical stuff, not knowing what happened, I understand that just because everything happens to hurt right now isn’t a good reason to not struggle to live. You know that you’re a bit of a wreck when random homeless people ask if you’re alright, though.

So, it’s been a long day, full of me sobbing and trying unsuccessfully to hold it together, of me gathering yet more proof about why it is I need to get off my current medication cycle given that it’s actually making me physically ill, full of me embarrassing myself and whatnot. Retrospectively, I probably shouldn’t have tried to stay at all. But I wanted so badly to try and be normal, to try and do a normal thing that I used to do all the time, to do something that I really wanted to do, and I underestimated how much everything is still affecting me. It’s difficult to explain it to people and it’s difficult for people to understand. It actually really hurts when people make fun of me for it, because it isn’t something I can control, nor do I fully understand it myself. But that feeling of hurt, which makes it harder to think even of trying, is something that I can’t really articulate because it makes me more vulnerable and more fragile in the face of future making-fun-of-me. So I don’t talk about it. Except in this blog, which has no bearing on or effect in the real world.

Wow: it’s Saturday, and I’m still crying while typing this stupid post. Aren’t I special.