Hello darkness my old friend

This has been my worst week by far. My baseline anxiety is higher, my emotional state is lower, my temper has a shorted fuse and my mental downward spirals last longer. That’s not great.

I could blame February - the absolute worst month to live in the Midwest with its dreary skies and perpetual dribble of rain, sleet or snow (dependent on the temperature of the moment). I could blame cumulative emotion that has been welling up for weeks as finally bursting through. I could blame the sheer exhaustion that came from moving our whole house, throwing away 2/3 of our possessions and transitioning the family and pets to Evansville in less than 3 weeks time.

Those things aren’t fun - and they certainly don’t help. But I know the real issue. Time itself. With each passing day, the four of us create a new normal, begin setting in routines, figuring out what life looks like for the 4 of us to live in the apartment. An address that will never include Bunny.

With the house empty, the to-do list is checked off and thrown in the trash. Now our days aren’t preparing for the next thing - we are living the next thing. Without her.

The boys birthday was in a detention center, eating Twix and hanging out for our state-issued hour of family time - with no idea when that could happen again - but the hour passed. We left Bunny to be locked up amongst strangers and drove back to the apartment she will never call home.

And this weekend, we will spend all weekend as a family celebrating the boys in Louisville. Making new memories. Without her.

While she is always in our thoughts and prayers, life looks nothing like the one she left behind. We are building something new - something she isn’t a part of. It’s temporary, I know. She will come home someday. We will once again make a new normal and create new routines that include her in the mix. The day-to-day will have Bunny built into the activities and the memories will feature her front and center. But not yet. And I don’t really have an idea of how long the waiting will last.

I want to wait in a cryogenic tube and let life pass all of us by so we experience each new thing together. I want to bury myself beneath my covers and not come out until it is time to go pick her up and bring her home. I want to tell everyone that they can’t have birthdays and no good things can be celebrated until Bunny can be at the party.

I want the darkness to part - and instead it is settling in all around me. The million thoughts I want to share with her - her laugh mixed in with her brothers as David makes another bad pun - her voice joining mine as we sing to Tuck or reenact Hamilton - its all missing for now. And the silence shouts in my ear - where she is, you cannot follow...

“ Hello darkness, my old friend I've come to talk with you again Because a vision softly creeping Left its seeds while I was sleeping And the vision that was planted in my brain Still remains, Within the sound of silence”