It's Been a Hard Day's Week...

To say that this week has been challenging is an understatement. Losing a friend and colleague, learning about it and other news via Facebook status messages instead of human contact, disappointments in people I've thought highly, etc has just worn me thin. Well, perhaps a poor choice in words, there. Yet another frustration added to the list. Hard work gone unpaid.

I'm worn out, and my Monday hasn't even finished.

Death does that to me. Too many retreats back into the past, too many reminders of loss, songs swirl around in my head making for a most sombre soundtrack, etc. And it makes me realize to whom I'm closest, with whom I feel safest, etc, and I have to fight the urge to cling, steadfast, with every ounce of my being, and shield them from the unforeseeable to knowing that even when I do that, I can either smother them myself or be sideswiped by the reaper.

Insomnia is back, and this time, with a vengeance. At least, before this week, waking up at 4:30 am was out of a strange boredom. As of the other day, it's now accompanied by strange dreams with these most terrifying undercurrents. Even when the plot itself isn't horrific, the tension is awful.

Thank goodness for reliefs.

Perhaps neither family, nor friends, can comprehend what the hell makes me tick. How one thing can aggravate anxiety and how another can calm it. It's inexplicable. One friend can call, hang out and chat with me and make it worse, but another can be a jerk, and make it better.

I wish I could explain.

But I can't. So don't try to understand. Just go with me.

Frankly, right now, I'm too tired to.

Moments like last evening, when I can escape into the past, better times, simpler times, with just a drink, a good meal, and friends that bring me back to another place, and shed some light on a hopeful future, could last the rest of my lifetime, if I could make it so.

There was nothing more that I wanted but to hit "pause" on the remote of life and just freeze things, and continue to play in slow motion before life had to change the channel back into a Monday frenzy of commuting, teleconferences and, ah yes, facing mortality once more.

As I said to a friend, I pray that the next funeral that requires my attendance is my own. To bear the thought of having another friend, another loved one torn away is, well, unbearable.

So, I raise a glass to those of you quirky, odd characters in my life, that, even by being (pardon my French) royal assholes, can find a way to make me smile during times like these, intentionally or not. If you achieved that this past week, you are a gift.