Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Thanks Brother

Had a death in the family. My wife's only brother. I'm not sure why I qualify him that way but it seems the natural thing to say. Chuck was a good guy and I liked him because he seemed to like me. He wasn't a saint by any means, and lived a very hard life for the first half but he got pretty close to being right for the second half. So, I give him his due and thank him for the time he spent here and what he did in that time. I have always had a problem with grief, the problem being that my father beat the whole grief thing outta me as a child. Good training for my years as a soldier but piss poor for my years as a human being, father and husband. People cry and I get confused. Why do they cry, tears will change nothing, but that doesn't seem to stop them. I think it brings a release, a release from the pain. I used to wonder where my release was, but I think I have been given a gift of sorts. When they cry they need someone to watch over them, to do the laundry and shopping and cooking and make the calls they hate to make, I am that someone. So I'll hug them and bring them food and nod when they weep because that's what I do. I've got your back. So I'll grieve in my own way and say, thanks Chuck, you were a good brother in law, I am truly glad to have known you. Now I have to run to the commissary buts it ok because dinner will be one of my best recipes.

2 comments:

  1. Sorry to find that it is death that brought you to write something here. I think even as a kid I thought that crying was a sign of weakness and a useless thing to do. I've pondered this a lot in the last year, wondering if it was because I didn't feel anything or because I didn't feel the need to express it. I offer this: Just be thankful that after forty plus years on this earth you don't get inexplicably zapped with a sh**load of new and intense female hormones that end up totally changing the way you deal with things.

    I think it is not a bad thing you are the way you are, just as long as you aren't numb. Been there, done that.

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  2. I'm not sure what it is, numb, detached or absence. But ultimately, I feel like something is missing in me, a mechanism everyone else seems to have, something that triggers in these sorts of situations. It used to bother me allot when I was young but now I realize my own utility because of my emotional handicap as it were. I used to jokingly tell women, if you want an evening of laughter, I'm not your man, but if your dog is trapped in a burning house, I'm the guy you want around.

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