Let it be...

When Dark grey clouds hang-over

There is still a light that shines in me

Shines until tomorrow

let it be...

-Beatles

The gallery I designed for a friend is finished. We had our opening and it was sweet. I sold several pieces.

I am wondering about my commitment to continuing the project. I want to walk away now. The part I love to do is complete, the part I don't like to do is being offered but in exchange for my time and energy I am being offered a percentage of a commission that may or may not come. The risk of losing time I need for myself in exchange for a dangling carrot does not appeal to me. The problem is walking away from all the hard work. The bottom line is that it is not my gallery, it belongs to someone else and the way it looks now is my gift to her and not a partnership. My ego keeps me from staying and will not let me walk away easily.

My personal relationships are strained. I find it hard to be my old self. I find it hard to give emotionally. I can show up and do the work, I can give my time but I am keeping all of me, all the best parts of me to myself.

With Stevie gone I am minus my very best friend. I could tell her anything, and I sometimes felt guilty that I did. I kept forgetting she was my daughter and some things you just don't share with your children but I did, I told her everything. It was easy to do. She was a good listener. She was not judgemental and she could see so clearly. She knew instinctively and intellectually the heart of it, her advice was always solid and true. That does not mean it was easy to hear but you could trust that she was right, she just was, every time.

I never felt embarrassed with her, I never held back, and giving to her never felt like enough.

I know that people romanticize the dead. I know that it is human to deify someone you loved so much and I have no doubt that I am not doing that. I hate it when people do.

I love the messy parts of people, the things that make them most human.

When I talk about Stevie I am not covering her in frosting and glitter. A handful of people knew her and only three people knew her well. I knew her best. Still there was no one who really knew her completely. She did normal things, she got pissed, threw tantrums, had cravings for wicked things. She wanted to be pretty, smart, hip and have lots of friends. She wanted to listen to music, get stoned at a concert, and kiss a boy.

Try as she might it just did not play out that way. She was pretty, she was smart, she was hip and she could have had a lot of friends but she was stuck with me, and I was with her in the hospital, in waiting rooms, in an ambulance. She was here with the computer, her books, her music. She went to concerts, she had crushes on boys but she never really got out there, into the real world, she never got to play and be reckless. There was never enough time.

She had me, all of me, but that can't have been fun for her, she needed and should have had so much more.

I had her and I may not have had all of her but what I had filled me up. She saved me, made me strong, made me feel like a whole person. She gave and gave and gave. She made me feel worthy, she made me feel important.

That is gone now.

I thought I was stronger. She isn't here to remind me, to push and encourage me. I miss her insight, her wit, her love.

She could be really hard on me, she could be demanding and she could get very frustrated when I could not see what she could see. In the end she remained patient while she watched me run around in circles when what I needed was always in my hand.

I have people who love and believe in me, who are trying to hold on to me, save me, heal me but they are not her.

Sometimes I think I hear her, not her voice but I get a feeling about what she would say or think and some times I will say out loud, "Oh I know, I know" and I respond a little differently to a situation as if she were standing next to me. I wish she were. How beautiful would that be to know that she was here with me, still being my friend.

It isn't fair and I can not see how this was anything but a mistake that God made. I want to scream at him to make it right, to give her back, to let me trade places with her, at the very least to let me know that she is somewhere. I can let go of unfair if I know that where she is now it is very fair and she can be everywhere anytime she wants.

I am going to the city to have an aura photograph taken today. I am supporting a friend of a friend and hoping that in return this photo will let me see something I need to see. I need so much.

On Friday night I went out with my sister and my cousin Woody. We went to a cheesy club in town, found a table, ordered Cosmo's and people watched. When we were lubricated enough we danced to pounding music, three silly women letting loose, becoming the watched. It was bittersweet. I needed to let go and let myself feel good but guilt comes with that. It did not stop me from having a couple hours of fun but it was there in the back of my mind. We went out to eat after, we ordered all the worst things on the menu, grilled cheese, biscuits and gravy and french fries. We sat and talked until four in the morning. It was nice, I needed to do something different, to feel like a real person.

Today I am struggling but I am trying very hard to just let it be, let it be.

I have today.