where we belong

...the loyalty we feel to unhappiness -- the sense that there is where we belong. -- Graham Greene, "The Heart of the Matter."


Tonight I'm packing for my first trip since Rich died.  The first in five years that will not involve surgery or radiation or another medical procedure, that will not include Rich, that death will not be the mistress hugging him while I pretend she's a temporary fling.


Of course, I want to kill her.  Before she takes him from me.


I don't need the usual carry-on.  Even that's too much for someone traveling light.  Anyway, that case hasn't been unpacked yet from its time at Hospicare.  Zippered open, Rich's T-shirts and sweatpants and pajama bottoms hang out, still not bagged and donated.  I can't, not yet.


But I can travel from unhappiness.  A necessary place to visit, and I do, often enough.  But that's not where I belong. Because Rich won't be found there, and I will be damned if I let that mistress thinks she won.


Candace