I am Scared of Becoming This Song

A Boxing Tournament Episode #4

I am Scared of Becoming This Song

                                  

I never had an issue with choices except for when to leave and when to stay… Coincidentally, my favorite Bon Jovi song says: “I’m smart enough to know what I don’t know and fool enough to stay when I should go” and this has been the story of my life. I simply don’t know when it’s the right time to stay or leave and even after I am forced to choose, I remain wondering for ages in the middle of all the “what ifs” and my infinite desire to make things work. However, this time was just too surreal and too difficult to comprehend, so I decided to tell myself that he is dead. 

At first I, collected everything in a big box. I thought maybe putting all the small details in a safe place in my closet will help me put all the coffees, music, smiles, warm mornings, safe nights, books, rain, rabbits, kittens, pancakes, walks, ice cream, cookies, comic books, sitcoms, lemonades, photographs, letters, e-mails, and most importantly that sweet voice that protected me from me in a safe place in my memory and lock it all so that I can start over.

Two days ago, my mother was telling me that her friend has a memory loss because of a virus that infected her nervous system and now she can barely remember her son and cannot remember anyone or anything else, I suddenly jumped in and said I WANT ONE! Seconds later, I heard myself talking and stood up in shame of how selfish and self centered my reaction was. I told mom, that I hope her friend gets better and left to my room that suddenly seemed like a grave that pushed my bones and flesh together.

I placed my body on the carpet and felt the tears wetting my hair as I played the first song… The song went on and on cutting what is left of me and simply slapping my vivid memory over and over again.. He is not dead.. He just left.. And as the song was followed by another, my sadness turned into strong fear of those songs; I am so scared of becoming one of Fairouz’s songs.. I am specifically scared of becoming that one song; the national anthem of a broken heart and a very deep special lonely soul... I started singing along as I realized that I have been so unsuccessful in dealing with missing him… So, I put all things back on the shelves and threw the empty box away. I put the tiny details of two years and a half back… And placed the guitar pick that became my necklace for the past couple of years so that the music in that voice protects me from me.. 

I’m smart enough to know what I don’t know and fool enough to stay when I should go.. I keep going through the family’s profiles on the internet that I once considered mine so that I see the new niece’s picture or the youngest sister’s new handmade purse.. I keep trying to find anything that would make me safe again.. Yet, I am not safe.. And I am clueless.. And that song keeps on playing in my head day and night telling me the story of what I cannot afford.. 

When I started this series, I started by posing a question on life that gets us in ongoing boxing matches and never play clean. One hit takes a piece of us every day.. And the eternal question regarding this one piece that was brutally taken away from me is: Is it really over? If, yes, then why can’t I remember why? 

It is really ironic how our memories function.. How mine are so vivid with all the details that were taken away from me with a solo decision and the one thing that can help survive each day is the one thing my memory decides to forget: why was that decision made?

With all these thoughts and questions haunting me, I cannot help but hate me a little for finding the time to hurt for a piece of mine that is gone while everything/everybody around me has lost all the pieces they have between  war, torture, hunger, death and of course illness just like the one that affected my mother’s friend….

I never thought I was selfish, but is it a little selfish when all what I can ask the universe for before I go to bed is to let that voice know how much it is missed and how I still want to have it back? Because even though I can clearly remember how it coldly broke me into tiny insignificant pieces, I can also remember how all the coffees, music, smiles, warm mornings, safe nights, books, rain, rabbits, kittens, pancakes, walks, ice cream, cookies, comic books, sitcoms, lemonades, photographs, letters, e-mails and the voice that saves me from me can glue my broken pieces back…