the package

I knew he was coming. The little man, thin as a twig, with his feathered red cap and pointy shoes. I trusted he would come but when he crept to my door, pulled it from the pocket in his velvet cloak and slipped it through the crack between the door's weathered frame and the mezanine, I hadn't been fully prepared.

The package itself was flat and carefully prepared, as I had expected it would be. I noticed it immediately - it almost called to me the morning it arrived and its silver stitching glistened in the pink dawnlight. I plucked it from its place, it born of my preconceptions, laced with the kind of anticipation that only comes from simply not knowing.

The fine web, stiching the lips of the envelope together fell, away in my hand - the package was meant for me and the strands which fell on my hands and knees gained a reddish tinge, warmed and then burned, creating strange whips of rose coloured smoke. And I cringed as they burned where they fell, wondering now if I really wanted to hear what this package had to say...

But I had signed the contract, I had seen the future in quiet moments. This was my doing - I had planned it all! Panic rising in my throat as I watched the giant
mouth of the envelope begin to quiver and part. Panic in my jaw, clenching my teeth which tremble for fear of being crushed to dust. Strange sadness in my brow, a child in a fearful tantrum. Tightness in my solar plexus, where my sun shines from, as the clouds move to hide my confidence, my selfness, my strength. Fear in my spine, the coldness infecting my kidneys. My strength is gone, what is left is false.

My eyes widen as the envelope gapes its wide mouth open.

And I sit, with my disbelief. That the package was empty after all. The package itself was the gift, of knowing, of unknowing, of feeling fear and finding the courage, of trusting, of letting go. Of being, allowing and releasing. Remembering to breathe. Remembering to take the board and hit the surf when the swell is up. To understand that there was no clause in the contract that stated that to tie into this chaos is compulsory. Fear is just another word for excitement.

Just remember to have FUN.

Dissolution

So Im not the only one. I get it. But always attributed the dissolution of my family to the series of deaths that occurred - my grandfather and then, suddenly and unexpectedly, the death of my brother and then my Grandmother in the same year. Without the hieracical portion of my family, the family seemed to fall away, like the branches of the trees without the trunk.

Ive lloked at these things with precision. Ive prodded and poked from my side of the magnifying glass. Ive spent thousands of dollars on therapy and hours on analysis and pondeerment. It was a natural assumption - that all that death would take its toll on what was otherwise a pleasant and casual comradery. Death was easy to blame

Years of therapy have taught me that the sudden and unexpected death of a sibling causes tsunami of emotions, a few extra wrinkles and grey hairs.