the parents learned why their kids texted so much

i knew ten minutes ago that my parents had lost themselves in grief. nearly forty eight hours have scraped along since the schism separating life with mark reedy and life without mark reedy. we have cried in every space we have occupied since, unapologetically, but maybe just uncontrollably. my sister and i had gone to the mall to purchase somber funeral outfits (crying in the car on the way and in the jcrew dressing room), while my mother and father undertook the task of sorting through thousands of photographs to find just the right ones for a slideshow or a collage (it was still unclear then). as technology began to fail them, my parents grew more and more agitated, though we didn't realize the magnitude of their frustration and distress until we arrived home an hour later. both were shouting fuck and sobbing. it wasn't the fucking computer or the fucking printer or the fucking ink cartridges, and emily and i knew this and softly ushered them out, taking the baton for a brief shift as the semi-clear-headed representatives of the bodden family.

we have managed moments at best. i have felt as though i have toed the bordered of this thing in the past, looked out across it from its boundaries and envisioned traversing its space, and yet, my foresight was always flawed by its shallowness, or rather, by my unfamiliarity with the true nature of its terrain. friday night, around midnight, john and i were at the fleetwood; our food had just been set in front of us. my mother sent me a text message, and when i read it, i stood immediately and turned out into the parking lot. before the phone had begun to ring, i was already keening, unconsciously, maybe, ohgodohgodohgodohgodohgod, suffocating dynamically and in real time, stumbling away, unconsciously, pleasecomegetme. it seems primal in its nature, controlled more by the limbic system than the cortex, distinct from us, impervious to such human constructed concepts such as social norms.

there are 1,194 members in the facebook group my brother created for his best friend. i can hear my mother talking to him through the wall, like when we were little and every night our parents would do the rounds and come and lay next to us in bed for however long that day's activities merited discussion. i'm not waiting for her to come in here tonight, though, because michael needs her more. in his devastation, he has questioned the existence of god and rationality and fairness, and in some ways, i think the heaviness clenching my ribs is a sort of protective response. he and matthew have never looked more like their five year old selves, but my older sister compulsion to keep him safe and away from pain isn't enough here, which makes me even more upset.

the machinations of grief are just beginning to unfold, each moment of recognition of a new implication adds a spinning particle to the disarray. i wonder when things gain enough momentum to find form and structure and when we will be able to stop crying all the time and when we will sleep without benadryl. these hours have shown some beauty in their tragedy, a certain pureness of emotion that seems without parallel in its unconditioned, ragged, and boundless glory. we have remembered so many ways of communication without even trying. i'm crying again. more later.



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