joy right now?

I just unpacked the box that my father used to ship to me my mother's cremated remains. I had a deep, long wailing while doing it. I cried a guttural sound that came from deep within my heart.

It felt so very good. And for some reason I can't remember weeping and wailing like this since her death. I know I have. But the feeling was so new and so cathartic, it felt like the first time. Maybe the difference was that this time I listened to what my heart sounded like on the outside of my body.

My heart was also wailing in its yearning for some joy.

I know that we should all be wailing a bit more this year. Elections, Princess Leia, arctic blasts of cold, etc, etc. But for me that's all swirling around outside my own personal bubble of grief.

It feels manageable to have my own personal bubble of grief. I can effectively ignore all the other atrocities in this world. I am sheltering myself within my own grief.

I thought I would write today about personal development, the various steps I'm trying to take to be active in my own rescue. But after the wailing I realize I am not at the point of needing rescue right now. I don't need new habits or new goals or new anything except that which comes with each new day.

I do need some joy. I need an abundance of my emotions. I need to wander around my heart.

Mortality is the real shit, my friends. Some say the antidote to that is joy. The wailing I experienced earlier made me realize that it came out of the joy I am experiencing and that it is true I am experiencing joy. How can I not when I have a six-year-old who just began karate and reading. And knowing I get to watch her grow in ways that my mother never cherished in me and now, will never get to cherish in her granddaughter.

I don't know exactly what I mean to say or write. But the words seem right. And there is need for them to be said.

This is the truth I felt in my weeping and wailing: the grief may never go away.

The joy won't go away either. Unless I let it and that I know I won't do.