"Today I looked up how long it would take to drown..." (Forest Blakk, 2018) For the first time in my life, 5 days ago, I pondered the same thing, in a way. I pondered how much it would hurt before I felt nothing. How much would I regret it before it didn't matter any longer? Who would find me and how would I look when they did? Would I be able to do what had to be done, in order to get to the point that I wanted, where nothing hurt anymore and I wasn't letting anyone down and I wasn't responsible for anything anymore... How long would It take to drink the tea that would give me about 30 more minutes before agony set in and I finally died a really horrendous death? Just so that I didn't feel the pain I have felt every day, for 105 days of my life without you in it. And also- how poetic it could have been, to take the poison from you so that you didn't use it, and then I would have used it to see you again...I just want to see you again. I am not okay without you.
"Today I looked up how long it would take to drown..." it's such a simple phrase, and sort of beautiful, really. Such an elegant way to say you wanted to die today...
5 days ago I decided I wanted to drown. But not in the way I have been drowning for 105 days, where each breath comes with memories and the sobs that come in waves, from the pit of my stomach. I wanted to cease to exist. I was tired of feeling, grieving, losing. I am still tired of feeling, grieving, losing. But I don't wish that feeling upon anyone, and certainly not my kids, or Jessica. I can stay here a little while longer, if it means that they won't know what this feeling feels like. This absolute and utter suffocation that comes in tidal waves when I think of you. And guess what- I think of you all the time-first thing in the mornings, and I talk to you as I fall asleep at night. And you're there for every moment in between. I'm suffocating myself in an emotional suicide, slowly killing myself trying to remember you..."death is a strange and hallow inconvenience when you think about it" (Forest Blakk, 2018).
To say that you were just a "friend" is a huge insult to the love that we had for one another. And boy did we love each other. You were my soulmate. You saw me for who I was, each and every time you saw me, and you loved me regardless. You saw me in dirty stinky clothes, and then all dolled up for a date. You told me that my "mom body and curves are where it's at, and you are just fine" in my body that I was so self conscious of. More than once you saw me red eyed and soggy from literally sobbing my eyes out over a man that I thought loved me. Now I know that the love he had may have been the best he could do, but it's not what I needed. Because he didn't love me the way you did. The way I deserved to be held and loved and seen. The way it's so easy and worth it when it's unconditional and genuine. As easy as breathing, back when breathing wasn't so painful.
You were my person. The one soul that I could be anything around and you never ran away. You never left or got scared off and you never found a reason to stay away from me. You met me where I was literally every. single. time. for 12 years. You're woven into my soul in a way that I never noticed, until that fiber of your presence was all that I had left.
You were my one true love. The only man that ever loved me as I was and never held that love back because of some flaws in my human condition. You never gave me any reason to wonder if I was good enough, or if I deserved it that day. You simply showed up and you loved me in the truest, most simple way. The next man that I let love me has to fill those shoes, has to make me feel the way you did, because if he doesn't, it's not enough for me. I told you once that you were my standard. You never understood that, but I did. And what a beautiful gift that is, to have such a high standard of love in my life, thanks to you.
I will never forget you, and I will never be the same woman again, that I was on November 22nd when I left your house that night. The night that turned out to be the last time I would see your beautiful face, your smile, hold your hand or hear your voice. That woman that sat with you on that couch that night, she died with you when you finally found the blissful peace that you had been so yearning for. She ceased to exist the second your heart stopped beating. The woman that sits here and writes this is not sure who she is and she is not sure what to do with herself . She wants to scream and throw things, and pick fights so that she can yell at someone for something. Because when she's not crying, she's angry.
She wants to love you back to life, but not the life you left behind. She wants to love you back to a life that is kind to you and supports you and loves you back the way you deserved, because you were the best goddamn man, the kindest soul, and my absolute favorite human being. I want to love you back to life because I don't know how to do this without you. I don't even know what life with you means. "I guess I always thought that we had time to get older" (Forest Blakk, 2024).. we were supposed to grow old together, and have our house with the big wrap-around porch, and our mini farm. We were going to watch the sunsets on the porch with our cheap beers, and live out our days together. It was going to be you and me...
Right now this heart hurts and yet it's numb, at the same time. I don't even know how that's possible, but apparently it fucking is. It feels nothing- no joy, no love, no desire, no laughter...no future with you in it. Which is a bitch because what I want is to smile and really mean it, and I want to laugh and play and have relationships that I can feel. Right now the only thing I feel is that this is a body that I am living in, and it feels foreign. It feels heavy and heartbroken and empty. It doesn't eat most days because it just doesn't care, and these hands want to text you a million different times because the heart in this body doesn't remember that you're gone - until it does. And it's in those moments, that I have to remember, that I loved you and you loved me, and you are finally out of pain. I will carry you in this heart, so that its not so empty, and I will forever know that "I was lucky you were mine". (Forest Blakk, 2024)
Forest Blakk. (2018, September 14). Forest Blakk - Breathe [Official Spoken Word Video] [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3Xgx2ihf7Y
Forest Blakk. (2024, April 12). Forest Blakk - You Were Mine (Official music Video) [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTAOiJxJJFI