Yesterday, friends from my community group at church invited me to the baseball game. (I have been wanting to see a game for a long time.) I suspect that they invited me because of my Sadness and because a girl in our Bible study committed suicide last week. I did not go with them. Yesterday, all I could do was cry and cry and cry. I had no reason to cry, except for the Uncertainty and Sadness of life. It all seemed to swallow me whole. I am living with Barb and Jerry now, in their overcrowded house, but I am not really living there. I take a shower, brush my teeth and put on my pajamas there… and then I quietly drive back Home, to as much of a home as I still have. The only piece of furniture left in the big gold house on the lake is a single twin bed… every room is emptied of its pictures and sofas, tables and TVs. My room and closet have been stripped bare. There are no green chairs on the porches anymore. There is no coffeepot sitting on the kitchen counter. Even the rooster has left. I am living in a Ghost House. I can’t let it go, though, I am afraid to let any of it go. I drive there to sleep at night, in a cavernous, dark space, because I hope that the ghosts of Rosebud and Guard Cat and Derek will comfort me as I sleep, that they will be an anchor in my life that is always so uncertain, never stable. I crawl into the twin bed upstairs and I pretend that I am not alone. The first night, it brought me great peace. But by last night, all of the warmth and memories had departed and I was left, cold and trembling all night long in a house of dead space. It’s not my life anymore. I understand now, what one reader was saying about why men do not make “The Grand Gesture.” I didn’t understand it before, but now I do. If you really loved someone, you would just fade out of their life quietly and let them be. To ask forgiveness almost minimizes their experience. I think I will retire this blog. It started out as a way for me to tell stories. But the stories aren’t funny anymore and sometimes they hurt.