I have cried a lot in recent days. I have cried a lot these past five months, to be honest, but most of that has been for Dad, who died, though I still don’t quite believe it whenever I say or write those words. But that’s only part of the impetus for all the recent tears.

Diary of a chronically exhausted vicar image

Grief is an unpredictable creature, and surfaces at unexpected, inconvenient, sometimes completely predictable moments.
Like when you’re tired, so incredibly fatigued you cry. a lot.
Or when you’re in pain, every muscle inflamed, and you can’t walk properly or even sit up without holding onto the table to help yourself stay upright. And the pain and slowness and frustration makes you cry. a lot.
Like when your concentration is gone again when only last week, just yesterday, you were composing eight poems in a day, reworking your thesis because someone thinks you have something worthwhile to say in a book people might buy and read. And the disappointment at your capacity to do what you do, well, or even at all, gone, again, causes you to cry. a lot.
Like when you feel the weight of the responsibility you carry alone, and the absence of the friend who helped carry it and was good company as you worked together. And the guilt at crumbling, disappearing, your unreliability, is heavy and you can’t stop the tears falling …

Then, of course, you miss your Dad more than ever and you feel the distance from your dear ones grieving him too and – I have cried a lot in recent days.