fossils of grief

cleaning out my closet, i discovered a near petrified wad of kleenex in one of my jacket pockets. it's been there since may 12, 2006, the day my mom passed away. the jacket and its contents have been hanging in my closet for almost 3 years, along with some other garments that still have uci medical icu stickers on them.

it feels a little strange getting rid of remnants from that day and timeperiod. it feels a bit as though i'm throwing away my grief. as if it's rubbish and holds no meaning.  in a way, i treasure my grief. it connects me to my loss and my loss connects me to all that was and never was in my relationship with my mom. it connects me to a certain history of me and to a certain piece of history. 

but 100 years from now, none of that will matter. it's pointless to try to store up relics of either joy or grief, apart from what i carry in my own heart and mind. it all becomes junk that someone at sometime will need to clean out.

or will it? matter, that is. how much of our 'heritage' is worth keeping? passing down? things become junk when they lose their meaning, don't they? we value that which has meaning for us. how connected are we in our joys and griefs?

i threw away that petrified kleenex, and then wished i hadn't. a few days ago, i opened a jewelry box from my childhood (youth, really) on a whim and rediscovered all my 'real' jewelry, my golds that i haven't worn since the 80's. among them, my mom's pendant necklace that she had had made from her wedding band another lifetime ago. i don't even remember her giving it to me. i'm not sure she did. maybe i was given it by the hospital or nursing facility after her first stroke several years ago..? or maybe i've had it as long as when she lived with me in the pasadena house 15 years ago..? 

in any case, i took it all out and have been wearing them. they hold meaning of a life lived and somewhat remembered. i still have mixed feelings about the petrified kleenex, but i'm less wishful than when i started this blog back in april. it was bound to be thrown out at some point. the gold necklace, on the other hand, was bound to be reworn.

the big picture

wow, it's been a yr since my last entry!

time may fly when you're having fun, but it vanishes into thin air when you're not paying attention.

kudos to jooyoungee for giving me something to blog about.

we were at dad's after oppa's bday lunch, working on one of his jigsaw puzzles, all of us bent over the table, searching for any piece that would connect to other pieces that would complete the coming picture. as we kept referring to the box that showed the completed scenery, jooyoung remarked, 'all we can see is the big picture.'

all we can see is the big picture.

sometimes we live life only seeing the big picture, unable to connect the smaller pieces that actually makeup the big picture. we get lost in the chaos of all the disconnectedness, too impatient to take the time to organize and find the pieces that fit. 

and connecting the pieces isn't always sequential. as a matter of fact, it's rarely sequential. you find a piece that fits over here, then another that fits over there, and yet another that fits elsewhere. it's only as you persevere to the end that the different sections start to come together, and the missing piece isn't somewhere else still missing, but already a part of the big picture.

everyone knows that the smart way to finish a puzzle is to start w/the edges. figure out what the boundaries are and work within the framework. while this is true for puzzles, life's big picture may not have boundaries clearly marked out. then you do the next best thing: start w/the obvious. it narrows your search for the pieces that are harder to piece together.

those that really seek a challenge dump the pieces on the table and throw out the box w/o seeing the big picture. they may not know what they're in for, and they may not even like the finished product. it's the process that intrigues them, the challenge that drives them.

me, i like the togetherness of puzzles. that the outs and ins fit and belong to another that's likewise connected to another and another and another, creating the tapestry of a bigger picture. i like it that even just one missing piece ruins the whole picture. and i like that while the pieces are all so similar and seemingly indistinguishable, each has its own place for which no other piece can substitute.

and i like the togetherness of working on a puzzle w/others. that the piece i'm holding is the one that fits into the one you're holding and that the picture is made more complete when we both lay down our pieces...