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In the end, all you can hope for is the love you felt to equal the pain you've gone through

Two weeks ago, I reviewed Tim Kasher's show at the Loft. If you haven't read the review yet, I thought it was a great show overall that became a little unglued at the end. Well, at the end of every show review for DC9, we do a "Critic's Notebook" mentioning personal bias, random quotes, or whatever else we feel like sharing that wouldn't fit in the body of the review.

In the case of the Kasher show, I wrote the following in my Personal Bias section:
I am a fan of Kasher's stuff, but there are times when I find Album of the Year and The Game of Monogamy very hard to listen to. It's not because of the music -- it's the brutal honesty and vulnerability found in the lyrics. I think I needed this show.

There was a sentence between the second and third sentence that didn't make the final draft. I'm not pointing fingers or whining at why it was excised. Rather, I figured I'd explain a little more about what I was talking about.

Frankly, merely writing about this topic is a reminder of why I write: to get out what I have difficulty saying.

In short, between the end of July and end of August, I became single again and my band broke up. Both situations forged around the same time almost two years ago and both fell victim to erosion at almost the same time.

Once again, a big blow to my life happened in the middle of summer. Previous years saw a close friendship end in an ugly way, friends die after slow and painful bouts with cancer, a coworker die suddenly of a heart attack, and other things, all lining up at the span of the same time frame. And now this.

I know of people who have been through rough years and ask in the middle of them, "Can we just skip ahead to next year and start over?" I've thought that, but I prefer to not think about time travel or other things I can't change.

The one thing I can steer is my attitude. I can use these losses as a way to move forward. Keeping a positive attitude can be trying, especially when you're grieving, so I'm not going to act like I'm in denial. It's just that things sink in at different times, and when something stings, it stings like a colony of bees.

In an attempt to make use of the slow days, I've stayed very active with my exercise habits, my reading, and my writing. Matter of fact, there was a point for a few weeks where I worked 11-13-hour days between my regular work stuff and freelance stuff. But, like when I was laid off seven years ago, the positive drive can reach E and things start to coast on fumes. Right now, I'm at that point.

I can't give up on a positive attitude about life. I may say cynical, dark jokes, but it's always hiding some pain I'd prefer to dish out in small laughs rather than big tears.

Hope is not lost here. Far, far from it. I've been using my time to get a handle on where my life is now and where it's going. But there are times when I feels like I'm finally recovering from a massive blow to the body and head. Things don't heal overnight, you know?

Comments

I'm just catching up on your posts from the past few months. It's a bummer when stuff doesn't work out but ultimately after a few months your senses come back and you get back to normal. By the time you read this, you'll already be feeling better.

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