Our little baby Bengal died today at noon. She was a sweet, courageous little fighter who had so much love and curiousity.

Tika, you were a little angel that I imagined growing up and playing, wrestling, and napping with your big sister Aleyah. I am so sorry I couldn't protect you, little girl. You deserved so much more. I love you so much, sweetheart. I miss you so much. My heart is breaking for you baby. I wish you were here.

Tika's Song (Mommy made it up to comfort you on your way home. You loved it and I sang it to you quite a few times before we set you free.)

I'm a little Bengal, short & stout
Here are my ears, and here is my snout
I've got a lot of stripes, yes I do
But, guess what, I've got spots too :)

I love you Tika banana. Mommy wishes you were curled up on her lap right now. Tiks, you were so special. I will never forget you, and I will always wish you were with me instead of in the Cat Bed in the Sky.

Love,
Mommy

Labels: grief

when you’re caught in the middle of life it’s hard to keep things straight. i’m stuck. i need peace and silence and a break from things – i need to get out. i can’t figure out how to work this thing. i forget life is organic. i forget that when you have to make scary decisions they are scary because you don’t know how they will turn out, and you might be making a mistake.

is that our curse? to see the potential disasters of a decision that we can only hope will be good?

when there are hearts in the balance, the devil plays games with your soul.

Labels: grief

i went to the eye doctor today. i've never met him before - i have a slew of new doctors to see, now that i've found a GP in toronto. the opthamologist i saw today was incredibly personable - such a relief! so many doctors are sticks in the mud. i'm glad they're doing interviews for incoming med students. it's so important to have a good skill set in dealing sensitively with patients.

anyway my eyes are dilated - i look in the mirror and they are pools of black, with tiny tiny rims of greeny-amber around them. it's so bright outside today - not only is my depth perception altered slightly because i have to wear glasses today (normally i wear contacts) - but the light is making everything look overexposed. overexposed the way you can slightly overexpose film, and create a white halo around things. colours are a bit more intense too. definitely trippy :)

in other news

colours
since i can't see, and have to bend forward so far towards the screen without glasses on in order to decipher the shapes i am typing, i am going to paint in oils today. stinky, lovely, swirly, crazy painting. it's been a long time coming. i haven't painted in a while. this is going to be an adventure in bravery.

leetle caribbean frog
my uncle, who lives in st. lucia, brought me some little hand-painted figures from the island. he said they reminded him of me. one is a seahorse - it was the first one i unwrapped, and as soon as i saw it i began to cry. the last gift i brought my grandmother before she died was a beautiful glass seahorse she could hang in her room to enjoy. my uncle also gave me a seaturtle, and a little frog. they all keep me company as i work at my desk. here is my leetle frog.



love,
sappho

Labels: grief, love, perception

there isn't a proper word for the feeling we call 'missing', 'grief', or 'homesick'. homesick is a bit closer but it's still wrong.

that feeling combines achiness with yearning, longing, missing, and a catch in your throat. it fills up your middle and your joints and gets into the marrow of your bones. this is what i feel for my grandparents, for good friends i can't speak with anymore. this is what i also feel for very specific places: plitvice, brela, san remo, morges. it is what i know i will feel when i finally go to scotland and live there. the land of my grandmother, and of my mother's ancestors.

it's on days like this where i don't dare look at memories in my mind, or photos from trips. i know it will just make the ache worse. even looking at the green plant above with its new raindrops, a plant from outside toni's house, makes me ache. i'm working so hard to fulfill the demands of this ache. it says to me go. and it also tells me, this land is in your blood, but you do not belong here. you belong to other places, places that shape your imagination and your soul. places that trigger a recognition in you that goes beyond blood. these places are in your bones, in your memory.

it is a ruthless combination of instinct and hurting.

scotland, and the mediterranean. i belong to those places. i ache for them. and i ache for those i've lost.

Labels: grief, memory

it's a grey fug out. there have been sirens blasting all day today, what with the apartment building testing the system and fire-trucks zipping back and forth down bay street. i am home recovering from a nasty cold that succeeded in knocking me out for the whole weekend. it's the first time i've actually felt like i'm taking a break - hooray!! i have finally been given my one day of nothing. (which isn't actually true, since i've been working on the dance coalition budget etc. even though i really tried not to. the feeling of anxiety that encompassed me because i wasn't getting the ball rolling finally proved too difficult to ignore.) and actually, i do feel worse since i've been sitting up typing and formatting the budget in excel - my silly body seems to have an ingrained distaste for work. haha. so much for you, body, cuz the BRAIN is what rules on this planet. insofar as human bodies are concerned, anyway.

i have just finished diana gabaldon's breath of snow and ashes this weekend. i feel very odd, and sorrowful, after finishing it. usually i feel this way after finishing a book, - an odd sense of loss, and displacement. i think this is compounded by the fact that i really was quite ill and was more vulnerable (and more imaginative) than i would have been if i'd been feeling fine. in any case, i have an odd ache for the people i've lost recently in my family, and a kind of longing for the ties to still be there. which they aren't, i know, and never will be, but i'm being irrational, and wanting them anyway.

the funny thing that is beginning to emerge out of all this is a more determined and focused knowledge that i must, somehow, go to scotland and live there. it's my home. i need the history, and the land, and the familiar ties of my grandmother, and i have this odd notion that that is where i will find them. perhaps this is just a result of missing her so much. but tony and i have been planning this for a while, when grandma was still alive, and she knew about it and was happy about it. so perhaps that is part of it too - with a bit of my heart, when i told her and saw the gleam of delight in her eyes, i made a promise to her that i would go.

so i will.

Labels: grief, language, love