Remember that time I left class because I started crying?

In my American Lit class today, we were talking about Emily Dickinson's death poetry. I had skimmed some of the poems (I have been a terrible graduate student this semester), and had momentarily thought that it could have been a difficult class for me, but I decided to go anyway. After all, talking about death in an academic sense is completely different from experiencing the death of a loved one, isn't it?

Apparently, I was not able to make the distinctions as easily as I thought. I was fine, at first, but my classmates started bringing up their own experiences with funerals and grieving. All I could think about was my dad's funeral: the dark gray metal of his coffin; the drawn out service that would have bored him to tears; my grandmother managing to squeeze out the words "It was a beautiful service" through her tears.

And, honestly, I was annoyed too. My classmates kept posing questions like "What is the point of funerals? Who are they for?" We talked about cremation too--- which also irked me, as a girl who would have been my younger sister-in-law was cremated two years ago.

So, I tried to say something. I really did. I was going to talk about closure. I was going to bring up people who plan their own funerals. I was going to be smart, and I was going to try and put to words everything I had been feeling for the last hour or so...

...but I just couldn't do it. My voice cracked, I had to stop talked, and I decided to leave class ten minutes early. And, you know, it hurt my pride more than anything. Before now, I had been very good at compartmentalizing my grief and putting on my "Student Hat" and my "Teacher Hat." I felt like all of that went away during class today, and I was inexplicably embarrassed. Embarrassed because they'll always remember the time someone started crying in class.

And, I suppose to some extent, I'm ashamed of myself too. I know I shouldn't be, but I thought I was stronger than that. I guess, sometimes, grief is just bigger than I am.

Not Always a Wish Your Heart Makes

So I haven't posted in a few weeks, and I feel badly about that. I wanted this blog to be an ongoing thing, but right now... well, talking about my dad has started to hurt. A few days after my dad died, I talked about him frequently. I wondered what he was doing up there in heaven, and how much he was judging and complaining about peoples' reactions. But now that it's been two and a half months, doing so hurts. It hurts because it's been two and a half months since I have spoken to him, and the longer it is, the more it hurts. I know I've said this before, but I truly thought time would heal. So far, it's only made the wound deeper.

Last week, I had two horrible dreams about my dad. I'm not one of those people that thinks every image in a dream has some sort of deeper, hidden meaning, but these dreams were fairly straightforward.

In the first one, I received a series of text messages from my dad. (Actually, they were instant messages from his "MustangAndy11" AIM account that went straight to my phone. He contacted me like this almost every single day.) I was surprised, and told him I thought he was dead. He told me, in his traditional terrible grammar and spelling, that it was just a mistake. He had been in the hospital, but he was out now, and he was fine. He then started complaining about my grandparents, which was another one of his favorite hobbies.

In the second one, I was at home, and I was wearing the veil from my wedding day. My dad came through the door, and, again, I told him that I thought he was dead. He didn't have an explanation; he just told me that he wasn't, and we resumed our normal routines. I was so happy to see him, yet I didn't show it.

After both dreams (especially the first), I woke up with a second of hopefulness, only to remember that they were just dreams. I've found no comfort in these dreams, only momentary pain. I just hope they stop.