3.22.2018

When Life Goes On

No wonder today feels weird. Mark died exactly one month ago. The power in my neighborhood went out and right now the wind is howling. The weather feels more real than I do this week.

I vaguely remember similar feelings after my dad died. The world feels out of touch and I wonder about the value of life. So often these days life is found in money, jobs, images, and things. I feel like Mark pushed me back out of those things. Like I'm on the outside looking at my life. Is this what life is about? What priorities could possibly matter more right now than my brother? 

I've skipped out on a lot of things recently. Family things, friend things, and church things pushed aside. My last post talked a lot about people and how important they have been, but in the same breath it's incredibly hard to sit and talk about trivial things with my mind screaming in the background, "SHUT UP, CHERYL. NO ONE CARES ABOUT YOUR PERFECT KALE SMOOTHIES.. NO ONE CARES ABOUT HOW EXPENSIVE DOCTOR'S BILLS ARE. MY BROTHER IS DEAD. HE SHOT HIMSELF AND YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT TRAFFIC?"

I get it. Life goes on and other people don't know or understand. My life feels stuck, like I've stumbled into a big wall and I can't get over it. So I look behind me and I see how ridiculous humanity can be. How ridiculous I can be. Our lives are not measured by the little things. They are measured in emotions and relationships. Can we build relationships with diets, bills, traffic, weather, or shopping trips? No way and to be honest, I'm tired of living that way. Life is too short to waste on the trivial and unimportant. 

My brother was 28 years old. 344 months old. That is so tiny. He spent so much of it worried about money, success, careers, marriage, and mistakes. We talked a lot about all of them. These worries are human. They are stressors. His life was more than that. My life is more than that. 

This week I miss him pretty bad. I haven't felt like cooking dinner. While making grocery store frozen pizza the other day, I felt like I should invite him for dinner. I reached for my phone before I remembered that the text would fall flat, lost in the circuits. I want desperately to hear his quirky sense of humor that put things into perspective and made the big things I fight seem small. He had this way with sarcasm. He vocalize things with this flat line montone voice and make it seem silly.
 
It hurts a lot this week because I always felt like Mark and I were similar. We got each other. We were imperfect people who knew both sides of the track. We may have picked different sides, but we got it. We struggled with our emotions, but coped in different ways. We shared blood and tears. It's so isolating and such a lonely feeling now without him. 

His hugs were weak sauce. They were half-hearted feeling one arm limp across my shoulder like a fish while the other barely touched my shoulder blade. I would give anything for a hug today. 
Grief comes and goes at weird times. Hopefully my soul finds a way to anchor back to life cause this is starting to feel really hard. 

3.07.2018

Grief and Gratitude Go Together

Tomorrow will mark two weeks since my brother took his own life. I have a million blogs entries to write because this experience has been insanely hard and insanely wonderful. I know that doesn't make sense, but hear me out.

Today has been hard. I woke up tired despite the sunshine, the grief already stuck in my throat. It comes and goes on a whim I don't understand. I spent the day in one of Mark's plaid shirts, too large for me, and very male looking.

Right before I start typing, I open a tab for Pandora. Music always helps my mind to sort through my thoughts. The song that starts is "Unknown Soldier" by Breaking Benjamin. The chorus is close to home:

"Holding on too tight
Breathe the breath of life
So I can leave this world tonight
It only hurts just once
They're only broken bones"

Even thought today has felt sad and I can't stop smelling his shirt or his beanie, pretending his going to be so mad when he finds out we took all of his stuff. I feel so thankful for the people in his life.

I posted the announcement of his passing and his memorial, so I was the point of contact for everyone on Facebook. The spread took less than eight hours for the private messages to come pouring through.

Family: Tate and Lewis alike immediately responded to the post. They wanted to know what happened and what they could do to help. My mom's sister flew in town from Hawaii a few days later to be here for the memorial. My sister and niece flew in from Ohio to be here with them family. 
I am so grateful for my family, close and extended. My mom is very introverted and we didn't go to many family things, but they were there that night with hugs, flowers, and condolences. 
This isn't our first go with grief in my close family. In five years my father, two grandfathers, and now my brother passed away. I know my siblings and my mother handle grief very differently, but we came together and put aside everything to be there for each other in these moments. 

Marines: I won't lie to you. The Marines are my favorite response. Where family is tied through blood and constant gatherings, these men have very little attachment to me and my family. Yet, they were number two contact. I have to call out Chris McMurrin, who has been my brother from another mother over the last two weeks. He also passed my information to Staff Seargant Senese, who helped so much with setting up financial support through GoFundMe and the Utah Marines. These men contributed money of various amounts and gave my family so much support. I CAN'T imagine this process without their assistance and help. I don't think they understand even a little how much they mean to me right now. I am so grateful for the U.S. Marines. I'm grateful for their support and care for their Marine brother. 
Over 30 U.S. Marines showed up at Mark's memorial. They stood in a circle around my family, some in dress blues, some police officers, some in suits, and some in jeans. In that moment they offered their support and gave Mark a shout and a "Oorah!" In the church cultural hall, it seemed to echo in the walls, and for a minute I felt him standing with them. 

Friends: Mark's friends came flying out of the woodwork. For someone who felt so lonely, he was incredibly loved. Friends from today, high school, ex-girlfriends, elementary school. Mark often didn't feel like he belonged in our family and he found love in those friends and they showed it in their responses. I'm grateful for their responses and their help sorting out his affairs (now and the future).
I can't end this section without calling out my friends. Today hits me really hard because it's been hard. One of my sweet friends must have heard my heart hurting, she dropped cookies off while I was out running errands. My ward and neighbors have been priceless in this time. They have brought dinner, flowers, treats, and offered to help with my kids. I'm glad to be in place to know these women. I don't know what I would do without their support.

Coworkers: Mark's sweet boss, Jessica, reached out to me as well to offer her sympathy and support with the benefits at Discover. Mark enjoyed working under her because of the opportunities she gave him to grow and develop his skills. Discover provided my mom with a large basket of flowers and they day of the memorial, his entire team wore shorts in honor of him (he always wore shorts, even when it was cold and it was cold that day!) Like all of us, Mark had a love/hate relationship with his job, but I am grateful for Jessica and his wonderful coworkers. I met one young man at the memorial close to tears. He took Mark to work on Valentine's Day because Mark was having such a hard time that day. 

Various Spirits: That may be a funny thing to call out in a blog about people. I honestly wasn't planning this part. The day Mark passed away I heard him twice. Before dinner, I bustled around the kitchen and I heard him say my name from the living room. I looked in the living room, but it was empty. My mom hadn't called me and I felt sure I was "trippin". I'm pretty sure the second time was that night, but it could have been the next night-they blend together. Those first few days I had a hard time sleeping and I woke in the middle of the night and begged to know he was okay. In my head I kept thinking, "Please tell me he's at peace and he's okay."  Nothing, no feeling, no peace for me. A few minutes later I heard him say quiet with a joke in his tone, that familiar way we spoke together, "Hey."  This process has felt hard and extremely lonely, but I know that there is invisible help around me and my family. He released himself from his pain, but we are in it for a while still, left in a scramble of his stuff, bills, burial, and memories.

Recently Dave and I spoke about legacy in reference to the movie, "Interstellar". In the movie, it's implied that children carry our legacy in their memories. Mark didn't have children, but he has a different kind of legacy carried in family, friends, coworkers, and Marines. Mark's legacy lives in us and our experiences and memories with him. 

Mark's face more often than not, slight smirk with a question.