vague oracle vibes

 man, i keep having this strange feeling--my great grandma mawmaw bea always said this stuff happened; just accept it as a cajun woman haha--but i just have this feeling i can't shake that someone i love is about to make a bad decision that will somehow inevitably affect me too. i have been listening very carefully to those close to me, but it's nothing obvious. probably just me feeling a bit off. 

still unsettling, though. and i'm all for people making their own mistakes; it's how i learn best. i just keep feeling called to say or do something to stop something from happening, yet i can't even figure out what it is. it feels vaguely like this recurring dream i have where i accept that i fucked something up this life, but maybe i can get it right again next time. 

lots of "buts."

five hundred and five days

it's been nearly a year and a half since the world lost my dad. i thought it would be a lot easier, but honestly the grief became much more poignant this year. 

i'm okay most of the time, but sometimes i dream and i wake up to a different world and i can't catch my breath. i start regretting every time i almost went home and stayed because i lived in a major city/covid hot spot, and how if i hadn't insisted on moving about and trying to selfishly experience everything and stayed near my family, i could have had a little more time. i do always eventually remind myself that he wanted me to live my life as hard as i could. 

i also know that as much as i dream of five more minutes together, it wouldn't change anything. i know how much he loved me. i even feel like i know what he would say if we did have a few more seconds together. i know. it's just so overwhelming sometimes. 

constellations

 i have to apologize--even if just to future jessie, who will inevitably read back over this ages later to at the very least, cringe--i hate that i have only taken the couple of minutes to write anything publicly when i've been through something difficult. life is so much more, and i promise i know it. 

little struggles

i've been really terrible at keeping up with this. work has been really apeshit; we are shorthanded by two people every day and i have mostly been able to manage it but i've had a couple of really bad flare ups with this body that hates me sometimes and i don't want to complain. but my whole body hurts so bad and i can't afford to take any time off so i'm just kinda managing. but i'm grateful and love my job. 

i feel a little lost though. i work really hard to get through each day, and i appreciate that my work fam supports me and has my back, but i'm a softie and it's hard to shake things off sometimes. i had to hold my favorite dog when it was his time to go and his owners couldn't stand to be there. i slow danced to Africa by Toto with him in my arms til it was time for him to go. and he's happy and finally at peace with comfort, but man, it's hard sometimes. 

i'm also at this weird place in my life where i feel like i'm just going through the motions and feeling a little lost. i feel like i'm missing something. but i suppose it's a rite of passage. we are the bridge to the next plane sometimes. that helps. but mourning is important too. i say a lot of prayers these days. 

on chicory

 time is moving along. i recently found myself lucky enough to get a job working with animals at a veterinary hospital, and while i am so grateful, that's a story for another day.

most days are good; today was brutal. 

we had a lovely old cat who came in yesterday afternoon very sick. i spent what little downtime i had with her because she seemed to respond well to touch. we kept her overnight with fluids and medicine medicine and this morning started so well--she started eating again and moving around a bit. then we got a call from her family saying they'd decided overnight to put her down. it was crushing, but they didn't want her to be in pain anymore. 

eleven am rolled in, and while i was outside giving a quick bordetella vaccine to a pug, i noticed a man holding a cat carrier outside in the rain, talking to her in such a soft voice for such a muscular, broad guy. i promised i would be right back out for him. i came back out and asked him what was going on; he'd just recently gotten her from a friend who died unexpectedly--he said it was a sign because he had always wanted a cat. her name was chicory. i took her carrier and promised him we would take good care of her and that he could go--we'd call him as soon as we knew anything.

i took her into room two, opened the carrier, and tried to coax her out. she just let out a sad cry and was breathing raggedly and smelled like something ominous i couldn't place, so i picked her up and set her on the baby scale and she just kind of ...collapsed. i only kind of remember that i yelled for help and shauna ran in and went white and grabbed the doctor for me. 

the doctor walked up as i was trying to take deep breaths while comforting this sweet girl. she frantically started patting down the cat, looked me in the eyes, and said "this cat is actively dying. right now. she's pale because she's bleeding out somewhere." within maybe thirty seconds she'd located a big, hard mass lodged in her lower abdomen. likely a tumor she had been growing well before her original owner died. we immediately gave her some medicine to keep her going and comfortable enough while we waited for her owner to walk back.

many protocols and procedures were broken today. we let him come straight in to the hospital table with the heating pad where we were treating her. we all tried to keep our composure; i broke first when bringing him some water, having known his story. the doctor told him his options, but there weren't really any. 

i'm a person of hyperbole, i know, but when i say heartbreaking is not a strong enough word, i mean it with all of the heart i have left. when her owner said he'd just gotten her and couldn't even keep her alive, i had to excuse myself. i went out back and stole four minutes to cry alone (well, i guess the sky was sobbing a bit too), then went back in to help. we're supposed to be professional, but i couldn't help but pat his back a bit and remind him that this was long before him and he had done everything he could do and said a prayer in my head that he would be okay and that someday he would feel up to trying again.

everything was so somber after that. we had just ordered food as a group beforehand; i don't think any of us really ate when it came. we all stayed a bit teary-eyed and tried to mentally prepare to put down our hospital cat right after. we got her prepared and put in the catheter, and her family came. she'd been lethargic for days, but tried to walk right up to them with the catheter in, meowing. after a few minutes of deliberating, they decided to give us a few more days to try and make her better before giving up. so thankful for small mercies. 

and again and again, life goes on. i'll never forget this man and his chicory, who simply drew a difficult hand in life. sometimes things just aren't fair. but there are so many good things too and it's important not to let the darkness overtake the light, no matter how strong the eclipse. 

made me a tree

covid vaccine two has officially kicked my ass. i know it will be worth it and i'll be better soon, though. but every time exhaustion sets in, i succumb to weakness and let myself feel my feelings too hard. it's been four months; a third of a year. and i still think of my dad and feel his cold, dead hand in mine first before i force myself to hear his laugh and feel his warmth. 

please don't let this happen to me, universe. use my body any way that could benefit others, and share the rest with the earth with no pretense. maybe plant a tree and let it feed from my minerals. or just sprinkle my bones into the gulf. or shoot me into space. 

life might not have been super easy, but i will be in love with living until the end. that's how i would like people to remember me. 

in the beginning there was no sin

I put on a really good mask most of the time. 

I hold it together for everyone else. somehow I had to pick up the tough mantle for the family. i try my very best to listen and process and use whatever strength I have to keep us all going and moving forward. yet I'm selfish by nature and my goal is to atone for those habits.

I do know there is a lot of beautiful in the world. this is the one life we have and we have to make the best of it. maybe I've made a lot of mistakes, but I can still benefit this world somehow and I'm going to stumble my way through until I do so. feeling sad for myself doesn't help shit.