My Wagon

Ever since Storm died I haul this wagon behind me everywhere I go. No one else can see it, but it's there. It is one of those large, garden style wagons with removable sides and the large, inflatable wheels. Inside of that wagon lives all kinds of heavy, painful things to pull through this life.

Inside of that wagon is my guilt. My guilt is pretty big. My guilt is not irrational. I was there. I participated in Storms suicide. He did this to himself, so I will not carry that guilt, but I contributed. That's the heaviest thing in my wagon. That bogs me down.

There are balls of regrets rolling around in my wagon, all different sizes, making irritating sounds as I trundle along. I regret working extra hours when I should have stayed in bed with Storm. I regret every single argument. I regret every single harsh word. I regret every single second that I chose to do something that wasn't involving him. Regret upon regret upon regret, clanging together, setting my teeth on edge.

There's a big block of grief in there. Whenever it's not sitting on my chest making it hard for me to breathe it acts as the anchor weight in my wagon. It's very heavy. There are days it's so heavy I have a hard time getting out of bed. Sometimes I think it weighs a little less, but then I realize I was just going downhill for a minute, and then I feel the weight of it again as I start back uphill.

There are lots of little golden memories shifting around the bottom. Sometimes they are like bright little lights which jingle merrily, sometimes they are more like tarnished little bells, Still making pretty sounds but losing their luster. Sometimes they're just like old photographs, flat and interesting, but having no real weight. Some of them are ugly little stones that rattle about in an irritating way. They usually have the effect of making me smile, so I leave them there and pick out one of my favorites now and again when I need a little encouragement.

As I tug my little wagon through each day new pains and losses and heartbreaks and memories get piled on top. Sometimes things fall out, but I rarely feel the weight diminish. Most things eventually begin to shrink over time, becoming smaller and less weighty, shrinking to becoming only memories, tinkling around the bottom, bumping up against the more immediate matters.

I've become so accustomed to my little wagon that I sometimes forget it's back there. I get up and I go on with my day and my brain doesn't acknowledge the rattles and boinks and chimes and clangs. My legs don't feel quite so heavy, my burden doesn't feel quite so large. Then something will remind me. A word, a song, the smell of a grilled cheese sandwich, an empty beer can on the sidewalk. Then I will glance behind me and see it again, and I hear it's clamor, and I wonder how I forgot.

We all have baggage. Nobody gets through life without emotional bumps and bruises and scars, and we usually carry some of that with us. When I was very young, it felt like a small purse. I had emotional pains, but they had their place and were carefully organized. Before Storm's suicide it was a modest backpack. It was present, solid, and generally there, but often forgotten. Now it's my wagon rattling down the road, my ever present shadow to follow along with me in this life.

I walk on in the hope that the guilt and pains and sorrows of the past year will begin to shrink and diminish. I hope they will begin to lose weight, and to become memories, and be replaced by lighter, more joyful events like grandbabies milestones and the little victories of life.

One way or the other way will all make it to the end. I just hope I show up there with a backpack and not still dragging my wagon.

Shalom