Sadness...

really, what can i say?  it's monday morning.  i should be on my way to work, but it's going to be a later start today.  i'm tired, i am aching, it's monday and i didn't log on Sunday because i was out most of the day.  but i said i'm going to stay diligent and i meant it.

yesterday, is what i'm dealing with now.  this won't be long.  i did my thing, got up and had breakfast with Marc and then went to my meeting.  it was a good meeting, though short in comments.  i then went to visit my sponsor, who is in the process of dying, and it is not a swift thing. he's gotten progressively worse over the past four years or so, and he has gotten to the point of deteriorating, but his spirit remains strong.  i spent a couple hours with him and his wife, talking and just being.  when i left, i went to see my parents.  i stayed there a couple hours, washed a load of clothes, got the cable straightened out and tried to get the living room computer going, but that's more attention than i had time or permission for at the moment.  then i came home, had a very late dinner and got to bed.

my sponsor, my parents...an old friend whom i learned died 2 years ago, one who died last week that i haven't seen in ages...people who leave because time marches on.  what happened to the 20 year old who came into the 12 step program afraid, introverted, distrustful and wanting more than anything to find a place where people would accept him?  fat, cynical, bitter, weary, sick.  sober, though.  grateful for breath, for the ability to breathe.  this isn't about me.  it's not about what I'VE lost, what I'M losing.  i see my sponsor's face, swollen and gaunt.  i see him being witty and cantankerous, and know it's mostly for my benefit.  i see him too exhausted to rise with social politeness and use his urinal while i'm sitting in the living room with him, and i turn my head to give him privacy, as i did when he was in the hospital.  it's not the hardest thing to do.  my parents, they struggle with daily things.  my mom asks me about 2 Marie Callendar dinners, which do i think is best, and i help her just make the choice of which she wants.  my dad sits on the porch, worrying over money that he doesn't have for things that he either really needs or doesn't need at all.  and friends and acquaintances die, and the world i live in gets more spacious. 

i don't know how much of what i'm feeling is because of true grief, or just the selfishness of not wanting things to keep changing, deteriorating in front of my eyes, knowing that i, too, am deteriorating in front of someone else's face.  time goes on.  mortal things...do not.

thank you, Jehovah, for blessing me with all the good parents i've had on this earth.