I still feel a bit numb. I really suck at being an adult most of the time…
Last year, I was knee deep in work drama bullshit, juggling my spiraling emotions and obligations while dealing with life in general. The year before that I was at Staten Island University Hospital emergency waiting room with half my face burned waiting on news on if my grandmother was dead or not. April 27th will mark the 2 year anniversary of the accident that lead to my grandmother’s death. The fire was not the direct cause, but the infections afterwards were too much for her body to bear. It took seconds for a spark to climb up my grandmother’s sweater sleeve and spread across her upper body causing 3rd degree burns. It took seconds for me to react in putting out the flames, calling 911 and keeping her calm until the ambulance arrive. Sadly, it took seconds for a fire to change my life forever. I watched for months as one of the women I loved most in this world, fade away from me and there was nothing I could do about it. I could not understand why I survived with just minor burns while she received the brunt of it all. I am haunted by those images, the resulting smells and my disfigurement and almost every time I close my eyes I can still see her looking back at me.
After her death, people would come up to me, telling me that she was in a better place, even though I could not phantom how being DEAD beats being sick, I would smile and nod, hoping they would just leave me alone while I suffered. I was constantly told, constantly told that I did everything right and sometimes shit happens… and I look at them with tears in my eyes like a child asking: “Why?... Why does shit just happens?” I looked to mother to make things right. To undo what was done and make everything all better, but in my selfishness, I did not realize that my mother was just a child too. She was a child who lost her mother and I didn’t know how to comfort her like she had comforted me in the past.
When death happens in a child’s world, the parents or some adult figure gives them some sort of comforting words to make the pain not disappear, but understandable. Yet, nothing is really understandable because no one knows what is next after this life, so we say things to force us into a false sense of security. Oh happy joy… What sucks about adulthood is that you know about the same amount about life as you did as a child. You just learn how to sugarcoat things to make them appear better than it actually is.
No, Johnny… there are no monsters in the closet… There in plain sight.
Kenny.
