black does not have to mean you mourn.
today is Sunday. i had church. it was also the Rugby World Cup final.
if things were different, i would have been wearing an All Blacks jersey, sitting at the Rat next to a good man and yelling till i was hoarse. it might be where i’d have rather been today. but sometimes where you’d prefer to be and where you should be are two different places. sometimes what you want and what you need do not correlate.
i miss him, that man. every day. that happens when you’re close to someone; they leave an imprint on you, a memory. this is ridiculously hard. but at the same time, i know that this is where i should be.
if things were different, too, there would be another man still alive today, a brilliant boy of plaid and pain and imperfection. a boy we all loved; a boy who left us of his own will. his sudden departure confuses me and hurts me; this world makes me angry sometimes, it makes me want to hide beneath my bed and never come out.
but there is beauty, as brittle as it is. and there is hope, however fragile it seems. and there is moving on, pressing on. so i slowly come out from under the bed. which isn’t to say that i don’t cry, or that i don’t retreat constantly. “in present pain…” but i try, one step at a time. one foot after the other.
i went to the Rat today, but only after church. church - where i knew i should have been. church - which, as soon as i walked in the doors, became the place i wanted to be. at the Rat, i sat a few feet from the man i still so ardently want to hold. i silently watched the All Blacks pull off an unbelievably close win; i bit my hands instead of raising my voice. i didn’t wear an All Blacks jersey; instead, i wore a black vest with white print - my own. i smiled like a fool when the final whistle blew. i left.
black does not have to mean you mourn. sometimes it is a colour of rejoicing, a colour of celebration. and sometimes it is a colour of moving on - step by painful step.
