Unveiling

Today was Brian's unveiling.  A ceremony honoring his legacy and dedicating his gravestone.

The stone looks nice.  It marks a place where his ashes are buried.  Ashes of the body of the man I love so much - or what is left of his body after they harvested what was donated to science.

Everyone said that the stone is beautiful, the ceremony lovely.

To me it was all awful.  A stone marking a place with no significance in his life.  A stone with his name on it that provides no insight into the amazing man he was.  A stone that offers no healing, no closure, no hope.

My heart feels ripped open.  My grief feels new and raw.  My solitude feels suffocating.  My pain has been pushed back to the surface.  It is forefront in my consciousness.  At a time when others feel like I should be healing, stronger, moving on with my life; I feel just the opposite.

A silent pain.  A private suffering.  A stifling solitude.

So I drank a little too much wine, and I got through it.  And now it's over, and I'll be alone with this new hurt. I'll wear a new mask and play a new part, as the me that Brian knew slowly dies.  There is no honest me without Brian.  I am a stranger in a strange land.  A stranger to myself.