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So, today. I woke up. My mind went from sleeping to waking. My brain does interesting things in this kind of twilight at day break. Sometimes I carry things over from the night before; sometimes they're intensified, sometimes dimmed. Sometimes I don't carry them; I tuck them away, rationalize them or destroy them (or at least, I think I do, it can be argued that that's impossible). I can go from vicious to soft in two seconds flat. I can go from soft to vicious in two seconds flat. I can pull myself and curl in and maintain myself for the outerworld (or not) or I can lay bare and heated and open, in two seconds flat. I'm near obsessive when it comes to protecting myself so I always try to keep myself in check so that I'm not filtering sensory information incorrectly.

I didn't cry at the funeral. Balloons were everywhere, pushing to the ceiling; I couldn't walk in without bumping into one or two or ten. They were green and white and each had attached a photograph of Megan. The closest that I came to tears was when the pastor came to the podium. He was a short, somewhat stocky man with a bulbous nose and spiked black hair. Grey roots, thick limbs like tree trunks that were once still and animated I just couldn't bear to look at him. What he said, of Gods love, of the hope we must maintain, of the tears Jesus shed, of the sacrifice of the son...so thin and flimsy a cowl to soothe our fears at understanding, at being. We don't seize the darkness we create a hand to hold the candle, to shield us in our weakness and in our despair, and we have forgotten why. I felt anger, I felt sorrow, and I removed Megan's photograph from my balloon and put it into my purse.

Perhaps it's the lack of sleep and the headache, but after the funeral, at the bar with all the women I used to work with...I felt on the fringe. Divided. I didn't know that Megan had passed until February. I wasn't there when she died, like they were. It was a rare opportunity to connect with Ramona again, she stirred something so fragile in me, but I wasn't the same. Somehow she knew, and it was okay. As I left I made a wisecrack, and she smiled, knowing.

When I got back to Simi I stopped my car and sat in my front seat for a while. I still had my balloon. I reached into my purse and looked at her photograph. It's my favorite. I understand now that she went home. Whether that is an actual "place" in some manner we cannot grasp or just a metaphor for the cessation of being is somehow now irrelevant. She is home, for whatever that means, she returned to the state before her birth. She's home.

So, I put her photo back. I cleaned out all the garbage that'd been accumulating in my front seat. I stepped out with all my things and this balloon and walked to the middle of the parking lot. It was dusk and heavily overcast and in a strange way, the sky and the balloon seemed to be one color. Without thinking, as was intended, I let go. I watched it for a time, climbing somewhat awkwardly heavenward. I whispered her name and said goodbye. So many things were going through my mind none of them yet distilled but... the one I can even begin to articulate is...how much of our grief is for ourselves.. When I lost sight of the balloon, I went inside.

Learn more about this author, Ashley Anthony.
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