dannysmom

[dannysmom]

And if they did call, would it be enough? Is it ever enough? Why can’t I just be enough by myself?

[dannysmom]

I’m really trying to be a good sport here. I walk by myself. I eat by myself. I exercise my knee. By My Self. And none of my friends are checking in on me. It’s like I disappeared. I’m sure they are just assuming I’m ok or they’re relieved I’m not whining to them. But I AM NOT OK!!!! And I’d break the damn law and go out in public but I am afraid to get sick and die because I have no will and it will just be a mess for Sean. So I’m just SCREWED!!!! This is AWFUL. And I’m MAD as HELL with all of you!!!!!

I’M even madder because screaming is not helping. It’s 5:30 and I’m already in my jammies because there’s nothing else to do but go to bed.

I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to do this. Seriously. If I’m going to die from the virus anyway, wouldn’t it be better to just go to sleep and not wake up?

[dannysmom]

Been a long time, been a long time, been a long lonely lonely lonely long long time. This CoVid 19 shit is an awful catastrophe in slow motion. I’m okay on the sunny days because the sunshine is always a good thing in spring. But with the prospect of rain for the next four days, I am discouraged and downright cranky. I feel left behind, left out. Nobody is thinking of me today, at least, that’s how it feels. And I know I should be grateful—and in a few minutes, I’ll become grateful—but i am pissed off!

There, I’ve said it. I hope no one calls because I’ll just be such a bitch because what the hell, they should’ve called before NOW! So there it is. No one wants to talk to that. Not even me.

[dannysmom]

D refused to read get well cards. He never did get well.

When greeting card designer Emily McDowell had cancer, she got a lot of cards that just felt weird. “A get-well-soon card is kind of strange if you might not,” she tells NPR’s Rachel Martin.

So McDowell started writing nontraditional sympathy cards. They say things like “Please let me be the first person to punch the next person who tells you everything happens for a reason. I’m sorry you’re going through this.”

Check out her conversation with Rachel here.

[dannysmom]

Grief fills the room up of my absent child, Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me, Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words, Remembers me of all his gracious parts, Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form.

King John, William Shakespeare

[dannysmom]

Walls not windows

Danny's birthday is Tuesday. He would be 29 years old. When I started this blog 8 years ago, I really thought Helen Keller's idea that when doors close God opens windows was what would save me from the deepest despair. And in some ways, it has been true that life after devastation is not unheard of. But asking me today, I'd answer that instead of windows, there are walls of memories of his suffering that I can't scale. It's awful enough to be bereft of him, but to be beset by vicious memories of the varied ways he suffered is to be imprisoned in a house of pain. No windows; no fucking doors; no way out.

[dannysmom]

My world was already spinning, but your passing made me feel bereft. When we needed her most, she had to go. So awful sad.

Share your thoughts and memories about Gwen Ifill here.  We’ll collect them to be shared with her family and friends.

[dannysmom]

Let's read something together!

Wednesday’s National Book Awards ceremony comes at a time when the nation has rarely seemed more divided. The bitter presidential campaign exposed a fault line in the United States that will not easily be repaired. And while there’s no one simple answer, Lisa Lucas, head of the National Book Foundation, recommends one way to understand the other side: reading.

“My life is small” she says, “and I think books are a way to make your life larger.”

She recommends two books to help readers do just that.

One Way To Bridge The Political Divide: Read The Book That’s Not For You

Image: Raquel Zaldivar/NPR

[dannysmom]

Let's be extraordinary today!

[dannysmom]

@

Who is to blame for this state of affairs? We are, if anyone. The left. I am. Let’s confess it in all transparency. We were stupid. We forgot about a huge part of this country. We forgot about “regular folks.” We forgot about middle-class and working-class white people who don’t like the same things we do. It began a long time ago, this forgetting. They weren’t sexy. And anyway, enough of them were usually on our side that it didn’t matter. That was not just stupid but criminally negligent. We were also repeating a mistake that is older than our nation and that may doom us: the inability to understand who it is with whom we truly have common cause.

Our Southern Editor, John Jeremiah Sullivan, on the 2016 presidential election.

[dannysmom]

Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim

“Born to white plantation owners, but raised by her enslaved black wet nurse, Lisbeth Wainwright’s childhood unfolds on the line between very different worlds. A compelling, emotional novel set during one of the most sinister chapters in American History.”

[dannysmom]

On the last day

What if the last memory of his life is the worst moment of yours? I inhabit the memory of his last day, last breaths because it was the last day for him. And for me. And for us. Perhaps I shouldn't revisit this time/place but how can I not? If I pretend it didn't happen, doesn't that mean I'm pretending he didn't happen? He hadn't ended yet, so I want to remember every bit of every second i had with him, but it is soooooo painful and sad and awful. But isn't it just so painful and sad and awful and it really happened. It happened like all the good things that happened, so just because it's painful doesn't mean it doesn't have value, does it? God, I miss him so much. I hate the holidays because they hurt so much. I just miss him so much.

[dannysmom]

[dannysmom]

A perfect poem is impossible. Once it had been written, the world would end.

Robert Graves, The Art of Poetry No. 11 (via theparisreview)

[dannysmom]

Many more people fall in love than commit murder – which it may be hoped, howsoever bad we are, will continue unto the end of the world to be the dispensation under which we shall live.

Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit (via tatteredcover)

[dannysmom]

[dannysmom]