Word Cloud

     I haven't written anything except a few admissions essays in so long that the keyboard seems foreign to me, so please forgive any missteps. The last several years I have been in a very negative headspace, and I haven't wanted to dump my broken spirit into a blog post. Today it feels like too much and that I have to get it out or I may burst.     

    I have been getting back into journaling again recently for the reasons listed above. It helps to put the chaos on paper so that I can sort my feelings out and put words to them. Since November 27th I have started a pattern that is beginning to seem permanent. There's this thing called a Word Cloud. It basically takes the most common words you use on social media and arranges them in a random order in a picture. Some are vertical, some horizontal, and some sideways. The more often you use the words, the bigger they are. My word clouds used to have words like Love and Faith as the biggest words in that picture. The pattern I am beginning to notice in my journaling is that my biggest words now are, Angry, Exhausted, and Overwhelmed.

    I am so angry and bitter these days. Angry with God, angry with Covid, angry with Trump, angry with incompetent assholes, angry with my brother, and angry with my mom. I'm so angry in fact that the word has developed semantic satiation to me and has become just a noise in my world. Anger has simply become part of the soundtrack of my life. 

    I'm angry with God because my mom had so much faith that it killed her. She believed in them so much that she ignored science and her daughters' pleading because she KNEW that God would protect her from Covid. Angry with God because she got Covid at a women's Christian retreat. Angry with God for allowing her to be taken from me. 

    I'm angry with Covid because I hadn't seen my mom in person for almost a year when she died. That's almost a year of hugs and lunch dates, and zoo trips that I will never have.

    I was angry with Trump for a myriad of reasons before my mom died. The misinformation that he spewed about Covid was the last straw for me. Fuck him. 

    I'm angry with incompetent assholes because, well, they're incompetent assholes. Before my mom died, I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they didn't get enough sleep, maybe their bank account was in the negative, maybe their goddamned coffee maker broke. I would let their rude behavior slide off me like water off a duck's back. These days I find myself barely restraining the urge to cuss them out or come over the counter at them.

     As with Trump, my brother has not been my favorite person for a very long time. I vividly remember the last day I trusted him. I was probably six and at my grandparents’ house. The legs of one of my beloved Breyers horses had been broken off. My grandmother said they looked like they had been sawed off and Josh was the only person in the house that could have done it. I fought her vehemently over her accusation. How could she think that my little brother would choose to do something to hurt me? He later confessed. I was heartbroken. That was the last day I ever trusted my brother. He has lied, stolen from, and used my mom (and others) for almost every day of his life. He encouraged her to put herself in danger during Covid so that he could continue to abuse her generosity. Since her death he has started fights with his two remaining family members numerous times, to the point that we only communicate with him when absolutely necessary. He has not lifted a single finger to help with cleaning out her house or dealing with her estate. He has instead called us self-righteous cunts, bad daughters, and has continued to lie about the simplest of things. I'm mad that he will receive the house he lives in free and clear while the house I inherited has to be sold off to pay a mountain of debts, the mortgage, and lawyer's fees, among other things. He hasn't helped us in the wake of her death, and he didn't help our mom in her life. I could go on, and on, and on about the reasons my brother is a scumbag, but I don't want to waste any more time on him.

    I'm angry with my mom. Why couldn't she just be safe?? Why did she ignore science, doctors, and her daughters so that she wouldn't be inconvenienced? I'm so angry that she left us. I'm angry that she was a hoarder. I'm angry that it took my sister and I six months of commuting four and six hours to clean out her house. I'm angry that we had to spend thousands of dollars on dumpster rentals to haul away all the junk she stored and there is still a garage full of shit that we couldn't afford to clear out. I'm angry that her "friends" had her store things for ten plus years and who only communicated with her after her death through us. All they wanted was their stuff. I'm angry that her hoarding made it where we will barely get enough money from that house to pay her debts. I'm angry that my dad made her a hoarder. That she felt she had to build physical walls around herself to keep his abuse from touching her. I'm angry that she continued to let him ruin her life long after their divorce and his death. I'm angry that she only started living her life a couple years before she died. I'm angry that she was generous to her own detriment. She attracted the worst users and abusers. To the point that we had to get her church involved to evict the woman who was living in her house rent free for MONTHS after her death and months before it. I'm angry that her death meant nothing to most of her "friends." Somehow that wasn't enough of a wakeup call to make them believe that Covid is real. I'm angry that someone very close to her stood in her driveway and told us that the thing that killed my mom was "fake news." I'm so angry with her that she left us.

    I'm exhausted and overwhelmed because of all the things listed above. I'm overwhelmed and exhausted because we were finally starting to rebuild our lives after years of medical disasters and their effects when she died. I'm exhausted and overwhelmed because I have fallen into deep depression again. I'm overwhelmed and exhausted by the fact that I will be moving to Philadelphia, PA in a month to start graduate school and there's no way these emotions won't affect my schooling. I'm exhausted and overwhelmed that I have spent months of my life completely immersed in stress, exhaustion, and overwhelming anger, with no end in sight. I'm exhausted and overwhelmed by the fact that I can't fall asleep without the TV on anymore because in that silence all I can hear is the ER doctor telling me that they tried everything they could, but they couldn't revive her. I'm exhausted and overwhelmed because the universe seems to take pleasure in kicking the living shit out of me.