08: heartbreak in unfamiliar forms ☁
on grieving new york & resenting survival (november 2020)
Iteration #8 of this monthly letter full of feelings.
This issue's theme is: ✿ heartbreak in unfamiliar forms ✿
I remember when Tommy and I got engaged, I had this thought: what if I never feel that world-shattering, new chapter, gut punch of heartbreak ever again? I felt kinda stupid sad, thinking about how those periods can be exhilarating; they force you to shed all your skin and start telling a new story about yourself. It obviously never feels *that* empowering and I know I have a tendency to romanticize. I also know that heartbreak comes in many forms and without fail, my brain went immediately to "someone you love will die soon and you'll feel heartbreak again." But I didn't think about the heartbreak I'd feel when I had to leave the apartment I was sitting in when I had that silly small thought. Or friendship ending heartbreak. Not being able to see any fucking future heartbreak. Feeling invisible heartbreak. Not being able to just take the subway or the bus anywhere anymore heartbreak, feeling trapped again like I did when I was a dumb teenager. Feeling like a failure heartbreak. Seeing the New York Times on your parent's table and being reminded that after 11 years, you still didn't get a photograph in that damn paper heartbreak.
It's weird realizing now what I'm feeling is a broken heart. I start to cry whenever I read "heartbroken" or think of the word. As I'm typing all of this, I have a big hard lump in my throat and heat pushing against the inside of my ears. I feel like New York is my ex that I'm still in love with. I keep showing up to our old spots and expecting them to see me and fall back in love with me, welcome me back into that old life and kiss my tears. Obviously it's not a perfect analogy, but it's the one I've got. I feel that pang of emptiness and sadness whenever I think of our old apartment, still. I know it's a thing that will get better with time, and yes... it has, but it still hurts. I know I'm working from a place of desperation rather than autonomy; I want someone to save me because that feels familiar. I feel like 2010 again, post breakup, living alone in New York and feeling alone. I guess I just thought I wouldn't feel this way again until somebody died; in a way, I felt more prepared for that. It feels like I'm trying to hold on to a lot of things that need to be released in order to shape shift and evolve. I keep feeling like I've finally pulled myself out of the hole but then I keep falling down. I keep trying to make a lists of things I need to let go of, look forward to, but they all feel too abstract to write down in bullet points. Maybe I'll save that for the next letter, it'll be the end of the year after all.
AN UNCOMFORTABLE FORM OF HEARTBREAK
I've been having some weird-scary-funky-uncomfortable-scared-to-admit type of feelings lately. I've been feeling a lot of angst and sadness and I realize this sticky icky thought is resentment. I'm angry at my stepdad for surviving when my dad didn't get to.
This portrait of him hurts to look at. Not for the obvious reasons (I’m assuming a lot about you, reader, and where your mind would go when you see a father figure in the hospital). No, this is what it really is: I’m mad that my biological father never got to look at me this way, with tubes up his nose and in his veins, fighting to stay alive. I think about how much he must have wanted a second chance and how much he wanted to be alive. Everyone tells me about how he was a great dad, husband, friend. I saw a medium in Salem, MA a few years ago. She told me that my dad was funny; that he tried to make a deal to get another chance at life. She told me that my parents were soulmates and without each other they’d lost their right and left arms.
I’m resentful. This eye contact is unnatural. I’m not used to connecting with him. I’m not used to him wanting to connect. I’m not used to him sober, aware enough to recognize another human’s needs. I hold on to the few moments in my life when he broke the wall and tried to connect with me, as uncomfortable as they were: notably when my heart was broken. When I wasn’t allowed to see my stepsister and he snuck me out to see her. When my first abusive boyfriend told everyone that I made him want to die (but told me privately he was actually trying to get high) and I was too embarrassed and confused to go to school while he was in the hospital, so my stepdad took me to see Pan’s Labyrinth in the middle of the school day. When my second abusive boyfriend grabbed me and left bruises on my arm, my stepdad was the only one in the house to physically look at my bruises and say that he saw them. Like any clumsy father figure, not sure whether he’s supposed to be stern or gentle.
I’m so angry looking at this aging face and wishing I knew what my dad’s forever 36 face would look like with wrinkles, grey hair, chicken fuzz growing back after chemo, tissue paper skin with bruises from projects around the house he’d be proud of. I know now, after years of pushing my grief down and not wanting to be defined by it, that it's okay to feel more connected to my dead dad than by alive stepdad. It's okay for many things to exist at once: for me to feel anger that he's getting more chances while simultaneously feeling nervous that he'll die. Grateful for what small things he's done but angry that he didn't give more. It's all being human.
I posted this collection on instagram and asked what words come to mind when you scroll through. I got these words: generational, life lines, holding your breath, embracing the vulnerable, renewal, survival, cycles, safe, glow, little moments, big things, transitions, fading, opportunity, some sort of love.
It was a cool little exercise and I want to do more of it. It also makes me think about community, photo critique, classes, etc. I want to create a pay-what-you-can month long photography workshop where we just make shit and create a nice online environment together. If you would be interested in participating, add your name to the list here. :)
RECENT WORK THINGS:
THINGS I LOVED THIS MONTH
Love you, thanks for sticking with me even when my newsletters come months later than they're meant to. That's just how it is sometimes!
⋰ If you'd like to read previous newsletters, they are archived here.
This newsletter was written from the Onundagaonoga (Onondaga) & Haudenosaunee territory To learn more about the stolen land you're occupying, visit native-land.ca ⋰
