Like the tear rolling down my nose, I let it go

 Sitting in the park, my mum calls. My stomach tenses. 

These days, uncharacteristically I always pick up. We talk for five minutes. I get off the phone.

I take a deep breath, at least I think I do. All I experience is the exhale. Long and deep. As though I have been holding my breath in meditation. As though I can breathe the whole world out from my belly. The first voice in my head says - 

“Feel your feelings”. Let it sit. Don’t start the music again yet.

As I fiddle with my phone. 

Breathe it in. Uff. The waves of sadness prick my eyes.

I stare down into the blanket I’m sitting on cross legged. 

But I don’t see it. 

I breathe again and tears form. Heavy heavy heavy is my heart. 

One lone droplet rolls down my nose. I want to hold her.

I want so much to be able to hold her. 

The sun bounces up at me from the once white background behind carousels and little trees, little figures with balloons. My baby blanket. I’ve carried it with me but never really felt connected to it. 

I’ve just kept it as I keep everything. Carrying it house to house along with my guilt ridden feelings of abandonment, that I think are finally beginning to dissipate. As I learn to carry myself. 

It’s finally soothing. 

The sadness sinks into me, settling again into comfortable folds around me. Within me. Where it belongs with everything else I carry. 

For me to care for. To breathe through. It isn’t down in the pit of my stomach or the lump in my throat. It belongs to me and I hold it. 

Like I’m learning to hold myself.