case of the mondays

The day that I heard my sister was dead was the same day that I started my new job. I was on my way home, through what counts as heavy rush-hour traffic here in Las Vegas. I was feeling both lucky and relieved to have finally found a good job after years of depressing searching and slacking. I was elated at the free and comfortable work environment (a desk, a computer of my own! bathroom and lunch breaks whenever I felt like taking them! loose starting and ending times! et cetera). I was deeply relieved that my skills seemed up to the task, a task that I could explain proudly whenever someone asked what I did for a living.

As I write this, two weeks have passed since that day. I am still happy with my job. I am still unsure how I feel about my sister's death.

I will not relate the details that I have learned of my sister's later life. In referring to her situation as somewhat sordid to some, or at least distasteful or unfortunate, I am not being judgmental -- only objective. She was markedly unconventional throughout her life, and often in a way that was unattractive to many.

Both of us were outcasts, emotionally troubled and more often co-existing with society than dwelling inside it. Both of us attracted and were attracted to people with similar social and emotional difficulties. Both of us possessed gifts -- intellectual, musical -- that made us above average, but never enough, seemingly, to be called truly talented.

Both of us suffered deeply from the loss of our brother, in ways that tended to exacerbate weaknesses in our ability to live a healthy, happy, "normal and productive" life. Both of us suffered from chronically inconsistent relationships with family and friends, including each other. We were at a distance between our inner and outer selves, which also magnified the distance between ourselves and others. Neurotically needy and yet also neurotically independent.

I regret that we never really played our guitars together.

I don't really regret that I didn't go home for the funeral. My parents told me not to come; they reasoned that my new job was too important to risk for what would be, ultimately, a hollow gesture, an incomplete and unsatisfying visit. My mother added, significantly, that my sister would have understood -- and might very well have done the same. "She did what she wanted to do." Not always the right thing, objectively, but the right thing for her.

more to come