A1

holding grudges.

yeah.

i do that.......hard.

hell, my whole family does it.

we keep 'em close, and hang on tightly, 

and keep our fists clenched and clasped and clamped down,

harboring all those hard feelings in the otherwise empty spaces 

where far more productive possibilities could reside,

if only the unresolved offenses of yesterday could be balanced 

by some justice, or failing that, retribution, 

or at the very least some satisfying comeuppance. 

y'know?

the thing about holding a grudge, though, 

is that you're just afraid of loss.

it's true.

you get hurt, somehow, by someone or somewhere or something,

and subsequently, 

there's this sort of requisite transition from harmony to discord,

with a proportionate interjection of displeasure commensurate 

to how much harmony there was (or was perceived) prior to the schism.

...damn.

that's just some fancy language, neighbors,

for saying that the happier you started out, 

the more you hate on it, out loud, 

with bass-boosted A*-blasting amplified vehemence, after the fact.

real talk.

here's the thing:

there's a sort of historians' eye to the grudge holder-

investing in the minutiae of evidentiary justification.

and that's where grudge holding brings you-

to a sort of prison vault full of memories of bad news.

problem is, you can't have bad without good to compare it to;

and that's the rub, bub. 

because guess what you're doing?

you're really just remembering how much it F*ing feels SO sh!tting terrible to

have lost out on all those before-times, 

especially, and excruciatingly so,

considering that there will never be any more ever again.

damn. DAMN. DAMN.  

we're getting got by our own selves a million times over the initial infraction against your trust.

y'all ever get got?

it sucks balls, bro.

and if you insist on continuing to put 'em in your mouth,. 

on that desperate hope that that'll teach the balls a lesson?

you're clearly effing up.

yet, we still do it.

over and over. (although thankfully not literally)

losing is hard enough,

but a rehashed recap at every available relevant or irrelevant instance is even harder-

what a bunch of backwards bastards we are.

***********

there IS a point to this:

the same kind of folks who hold grudges 

also seem to stay steadily F*ed up from genuine misfortunes of life,

with fewer reliefs and remedies, 

just as readily as they hoard slights and hurts from the perils of simple human existence.

it's all about loss, 

and the investment of time and energy spent freely to trick ourselves 

into believing we can recoup some sort of sanity and serenity from it.

that's no joke.

friends,

today is the day.

no. but it really is.

for some, here in the u.s. it's a barbecue-time day-off long weekend celebration.

but for me and mine,

today is THE day.

my youngest sister's first posthumous birthday.

...and i'm willing to wager any sum on offer that we ALL woke up crying this morning.

why?

because that's what we DO.

we dwell on how sad and empty and awful it is without her around.

and we steep in the hurt as a kind of tribute, or sacrifice, or penance, even,

for all that we did what we could, or worse, less than what we should,

when she was here....but can do not one bit more ever again.

it hurts, we say.

you can't imagine, we say.

it's worse than anything, we say.

and we live with that panic and pain for fear of letting their memory fade.

almost as if moving forward would erase them from our daily life.

and if we just keep suffering, they're never really gone.

we dwell on our loss, because in all actuality,

that's all we have left of what's not coming back-

it's almost as if we fear feeling better.

it's almost like none of us wants her life to be relegated to the periphery,

and so we keep her wrapped around us like a leaden straightjacket.

the constant reminiscing is the only way to keep her around in the immediate present.

we're a family of the sorest losers,

and we lose more than we win. 

what's more,

we'll take collateral losses of an epic magnitude 

to mitigate the initial hit to our emotional and spiritual reserves.

the more we hurt, they more she mattered.

or something like that.

we're over here holding a grudge against life itself,

and against circumstance,

and against coincidence,

and against conscious choice.

that's hard labor on labor day,

and we're doing hard time in a cell of our own design.

today,

my heart goes out to my ma and my father and my sister.

we hold grudges, and we grudgingly let go of our hurt.

maybe today is the day that changes.

maybe today is the day we start living harder,

and trying harder, and moving forward.

it's ok to miss her.

but it's not ok to miss out on everything else because of that.

it's ALL still really happening, 

and we should pay off our debt by filling in these glaring blanks with tributes,

instead of digging them deeper with rivers of tears.

it hurts until it doesn't. 

but not hurting doesn't make her memory any less.

i love her, i love them, 

and i'm grateful for all the time we were and will be given;

never quiet, never soft......