And it’s still going.

I’ve been so grateful to have my friends around to start the year. It was too short, and also a lot of things at the same time. I could feel my brain overloading and needing just a sit and a rest for a few hours. I space out — just feeling content sitting in the same room with people I love, on my side of the world for once. I recognize how rare an opportunity this is for us to breathe the same air. To just hear them laughing not from a microphone.

My life is different from what I thought it would be growing up. It’s filled with pockets of sunshine when the dark that I deal with every day threatens to take over. When the voice in my head saying that there is no good to all of this really, I get a random text from someone I love across the world, reminding me how much there is for me to look forward to.

Maybe it’s the lack of sleep that’s talking. -J

Lately, I keep catching myself letting out, or gasping for air. I literally keep holding my breath and don’t know why I’m doing it. I still don’t. But it’s now an annoying reaction to a lot of things.

Maybe it’s a reminder to take deeper breaths. Maybe it’s an indication that I’m holding inner tension. All I know is that it’s an inconvenient reaction to things that I’m trying to understand.

-J

Less than a month after we lost Chester, our last dog Backo left us too. He was six and got sick really quickly. It was the first time we had to decide to end a pet’s pain. It happened very quickly, and the vet that helped him go over the rainbow bridge was kind enough to let us do it at home.

I’m grateful. That he didn’t suffer long. That we were able to say goodbye and help him through it. That it went peacefully. That we could afford the choice that didn’t force him through more pain. But for the whole of his existence I felt bad for Baracko. I should, and could have done better for him, but I didn’t.

So now we are a dogless, Chesterless household and now going into a new calendar year, we’re not any closer to being a home good enough for a new pet to be in. And i’m not placing blame unto anyone in particular. I’m hardly a rabbit mom sometimes, the amount of time I’m not home. I know I can only do this because Joannaman loves Peeper as much as I do. And I’m lucky to have that. And I admit I was not that when she needed me to for Oprah. And I will carry that in my conscience for the rest of my days.

So I’m asking the universe to stop challenging me to scar tissue and to please just send me kindness. A gentle breeze instead of the rough winds that have been ripping through my emotional sails.

Please?

-J