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There is a picture of me that was taken at a concert. I am dancing with a couple of friends in the crush of the crowd and my face is red and I am glistening with sweat and my hair is frizzy and untamed but it is the expression on my face that catches my attention: unadulterated joy.
Like an amnesiac (or at least the amnesiacs on soap operas) I am revisiting the past so as to find my way to the future; a sort of retracing of steps; photo albums are the bread crumbs on the trail home. It is just too surreal that in less than two years I have gone from doing my best to enjoy life no matter what to dreading waking up. Physical proof might be the only thing that could convince me that I haven’t always been prone to crying at Sylan commercials. Besides, I also need some motivation to get better; knowing that a pretty alright person is lurking in here somewhere might inspire me to fight this.
There are the pictures from a road trip I took with six of the greatest people on earth, my best friends, and from years of summers at the cottage, hundreds from the parties that I used to love throwing and even more of me posing with my sister or hamming it up with my brother.
I scour the photographs, anxiously searching for something familiar the way you scan a crowded room for a friendly face but I just see a grinning stranger. A stranger surrounded by my loved ones, living what I so desperately want to be my life.
How could that be me? The contrast is jarring and completely demoralizing. That person is in colour and I am a palette of gray. Those eyes are bright, smiling; mine are tired and dead.
Even worse are my baby pictures. God, I was a cute-ass baby; a blonde little cherub with big blue eyes and a sweetly shy smile. I look at my mum and my dad and my grandparents, aunts, uncles and they are starring at baby me with adoration and pride and all I feel is guilty for having let them all down.
Far from bolstering hope, I feel painfully sad. All the reminders of fun are daggers to my heart. I am uncertain whether I will ever be able to experience happiness again and whether the same things will give me joy. Will I love to read? Will I be able to see shows again or even appreciate music in any capacity? What about cooking, writing or playing squash? Will I be able to carry on a conversation, rant and go on tangents or engage in witty banter? I loved banter! Will I ever again sit on the dock at dusk and want to weep from the weight of peace? I can’t imagine laughing until my sides hurt or just smiling and meaning it.
I grieve for my past because it seems as lost as a dinghy to the raging sea. With nothing to anchor me and nothing to look forward to I am forced to exist only in the present and that present is often lined with broken glass.
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