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Alone

I had a very, very rough weekend these last few days. And, the hell of it is, I, in no way, shape, or form had anticipated any of this. I feel so desperately alone and isolated. It feels as if I am in an infinite void.

In a nutshell, what happened is that I was helping my wife prepare for a party. We were having the party in a small room in the basement of a school my wife has access to. It is convenient because of the cooking facilities and makes it easy to have a larger group than would be comfortable in our home.

The day before the party, I was attempting to help my wife decorate the room and without knowing it, and truly without meaning to, I made my wife very angry at me. She did not tell me why she was angry until after the decorating was concluded and told me I had usurped her ideas for decorating and "took over". It was not my intention in any way to do this. I was simply trying to be a good worker bee and help out.

Things did not improve in the evening, because of a batch of cookies that did not turn out as hoped. I began to feel very alone, and terribly sad and isolated. I went to bed alone (my wife stayed up watching a movie).

The next day, a Mass was being said for my Mother at her primary parish (across town) where her funeral was held. So, we went to the church. It was a very difficult time as there were many distractions. By the time church was done, I was feeling more out of sorts than I had when I woke up. They did not even mention my mother's name even once. That hurt. Following the mass, I spoke with Sr. Helen and gave her the just shy of $600 in gift intentions we had received in the time since my mother's funeral. My sisters were there with the nun as well and they got into a long discussion of how to use the money. To me, all the chatter was annoying and did not matter and I grew more frustrated the longer it took.

At the party that afternoon, I felt so angry and so scared and so enormously tired that I could barely speak and truly did not talk to anyone unless they purposefully forced me into conversation. I tried to hover around to appear as if I were participating and ducked out of the crowd whenever I could figure out how to do so. I needed to be by myself to cry and to let my anger and resentment out. Unfortunately, my behavior upset my wife and she also did not enjoy the party.

When we eventually arrived home, my wife and I had words. I ended up laying down in the bathtub and crying and sobbing uncontrollably. I felt utterly alone, I felt as if I were to never feel love again. I felt I had reached a cavern where I would never be able to escape. I felt so empty, so very, very harshly isolated and alone. The despair made me feel hollow and lifeless. I just laid there in the tub, sobbing until my eyes stopped producing tears.

How can this be my life? How can it be that I could be so mistaken? Why is it that even with the truest and most sincere intentions to help, to do good work, to try to make things better..... why is it that I failed so utterly? How can I know how to do anything or be anything if I cannot even understand that simple idea? How can it be? How can I be so wrong about everything when I try so hard to be good, try so hard to be kind, try so hard to be understanding?

Why, God, why do I have this as my life? Why cannot I have peace and contentment? Why do I fail at everything about life? Why do I not know?

Please let Mom talk to me, please.

PipeTobacco