I don't give into it often—not much at all really, all things considered—but the woe has settled firmly over my heart this day. I don't know why, really, why today of all days. Last year at this time I wasn't doing much but accompanying my family to Amish-country to buy goodies for our "Up North" excursion, and nursing a concussion, of course.

Yes, there's the ache of on-going recovery still, but I'm adjusted to it. I know there will be good days and bad days. That's not it, I learned the incomprehension of pain while caring for my mother. I've lately been going through boxes packed during another life, and while I'm keenly aware that my life is better now than it was then, it's hard looking at the proposed future of something long-dead. I found a different Laura in those boxes, with different dreams...there are parts of her that I miss.

I have been letting my father bend my ear as of late. It makes me feel glad to be a strength for him, to feel like I'm benefiting someone just by existing and giving my time. I had a couple of beers with him at The Firehouse Thursday night...he was tickled pink. His daughter. Drinking beer. He finally sees a bit of himself in me. We shared another one just tonight, at his house. The man doesn't heal from things. He still hurts from events of three years ago.

I wish I could share with him the glory of forgetting.

He isn't a willing student.

I awoke last night, Nick tells me, crying. I remember only dreaming of my mother's face. Today, I picked up her driver's licence, the license we once had an argument over in the winter of 2004. We were morning over bad DMV photos when she muttered that luckily she didn't need to worry about another bad driver's licence mug, her licence expiring in 2012. I remember glaring her way and stating none too nicely that she would still be alive in 2012, and that I didn't want to hear any arguments on the subject.

I'm the hopeful sort.

Though, I don't think her picture is bad at all. She looks healthy...a full head of hair and skin unpainted from jaundice. She was a truly beautiful woman. I also picked up two scraps of paper she carried with her always, two scraps of paper that have a sort of importance to me because I knew what they were to her. It was the appointment reminder to her CT Scan and her Oncological follow-up on June 2, 2005. What a shitty day, excuse my French.

Off topic, but whenever I speak rapid French around my father, he scolds, "Don't use that kind of language around me!" I find it funny, though I'm forced to roll my eyes and groan so that I don't let on that his humor, well, humors me. He can't ever know. Ever. I'm fairly sure the world would end, pigs would fly, and Christine Bellport would stop trying to be funny.

While dealing with my insomnia last night, and granted the sleeplessness is likely a large part to blame for my altogether bleak outlook on things, I saw a commercial for a prescription sleep aid. It began, "Not all insomnia is the same. Some people just can't fall asleep...some people can fall asleep but they can't stay asleep. Some people suffer from both." All the while, I was nodding my head. I won't get it, naturally. "May be habit forming" is a warning bell in my ears. I'm OCD-prone...heck, in my world, candy corn is habit forming.

While visiting with Dad, I saw the pastel yarn Mom bought to start knitting a baby blanket. She so desperately wanted a grandchild before she died...and I did all that I could to make it happen, but in the end I wasn't well enough equipped...I deserved a merit badge for my dedication to the project, I'm pretty sure. I also have the wooden ornament she bought me to hang in a nursery, the stuffed animals she began collecting, and the baptism dress I wore as an infant, in which she wished me dress my child on that most holy day.

Heavy-hearted, I looked over my surgeon's notes on my chart, the notes I received just today. I looked at all that ails, stated so plainly, and I felt so cold. I'm just a fact or figure—that's unfair, actually: I'm a statistic of note. I asked for the notes to submit to my insurance company who covered my surgery/hospital stay, but denied a claim with anesthesiology. So basically, they were okay-ed to cut me open but I wasn't allowed to be knocked out for the exercise. A shame, too...because the notes suggest that I had several rectal exams during my surgery's nap time. I rather enjoyed not being conscience for this, as you might imagine.

Dad says he still hurts, he's confused and trying to figure it all out. He doesn't like other people poking their opinions into his life, and I can't say that I blame him. He says he can't bring himself to clean out the rest of Mom's clothing, shoes, just yet. He says he can't bring himself to change the voice mail greeting on his home phone from Mom's voice. I personally always call his cell because it's haunting to hear her speaking again. He says people ask him, "Is that your daughter's voice on you phone?" Dad replies no, unwilling to tell them who it is. "...sounds just like her." And secretly, I'm flattered. Do I sound like my mother? It is her voice that I hear when I am weary, when I need comfort most...her voice so sweet that I've built a fairy tale around its soft splendor. Dad says yes, that I sound like Mom, like his Liela.

I am so tired.