dancing with a ghost

a letter to my mother, and a letter to you

Hi my friends, 

I began writing this on a Friday evening, and it is now a Saturday afternoon in Roma. Of course, we had our Zara candles lit and our sleep balm and lip mask applied while writing this letter to you. There’s a jar of rose petals and a bouquet of dried lavender beside my bed, because we are always about curating a bedtime aesthetic. I was mid chamomile tea when my melatonin kicked in, and I woke up beside my open laptop and uncharged phone. It was very Carrie Bradshaw-esque. 

Now, we are propped up with a million and one pillows on our sofa. Espresso beside us, a Saturday charcuterie board being picked at, as today is my dedicated writing day and we need all of the prosciutto we can get. 

Speaking of, I have to tell you something because I feel like you’ll laugh. My notes app contains a multitude of things. One of those things is a list of prepared captions for when I decide to hard launch my boyfriend. I even have it organized according to potential guy. Am I getting back together with an ex? Is it my old Italian lover? Is it a new Australian soulmate? Whoever it may be - it is imperative that we are prepared with the perfect one liner at all times. 

Anyways, I want to be honest with you today -  because I believe I have built a relationship with all of my readers based on trust and vulnerability, and I appreciate you listening to my stories. 

I love to write about topics that, for lack of a better word - haunt me. That make me question and feel things that can be easily shied away from. I love to write about death and grief and heartbreak, not because I am someone who enjoys being sad all of the time, but because I enjoy putting together pieces of unfinished stories. 

I have learned that there are some heartbreaks that are worth one paragraph in our letters to life. Some are meant to be easily forgotten, some will span over the course of a few summer months, and if we’re lucky, some aren’t meant to end.

But I believe that the biggest heartbreak a young girl can go through is the loss of her mother.  And I do not ever want to stop writing about it, because art is where she exists now. 

People say many things about death, most of which are blanketed statements that I will always internally, roll my eyes at. But, to quote the iconic Billie Joe Armstrong when he is talking about (the other iconic) Wake Me Up When September Ends: “When you lose a parent, you are starting from Year 0.”

There is a song that carried me through my Italian Sad Girl Summer, and it was St. Vincent’s Slow Disco. 

Slip my hand from your hand, leave you dancing with a ghost. 

Well, I have realized we all have relationships with ghosts. And if you don’t believe in ghosts, then I will say spirits. And if you don’t believe in spirits, then I will say the past. 

Year 0. Year 0 begins as the nurse tells you it’s time. Year 0 begins as the three of you let go of an embrace over a sleeping body. The body, dressed in a blue floral nightgown. Hazel eyes closed. Her face relaxed. Hands by her side. The softest hands. Hands with stray tubes and wires that lie on the bed with her. Her hands are still her hands, but they are the last of a protective thing.   

Year 0 begins with adult words like cremation, medically assisted suicide, and memorial arrangements being tossed around at the kitchen table while you try to stomach a yogurt bowl and smoothie.

Year 0. The columns and pillars of a home will loosen when a mother passes. No matter how much she tried to protect you and prevent the collapse with more time, more truth, safety nets, promises, and future plans. The columns will fall, and we will all fall. 

Year 0. We’re going to begin again, Emily. We’re going to begin again. 

I sway in place to a slow disco. A glass for the saints, and a bow for the road. 

Time is like a mirror.

A mirror that shows our reflection to the fluidity of life. 

Have we welcomed or resisted that flux?

Time is like a mirror, and a mirror is like our truth. 

Slip my hand from your hand, leave you dancing with a ghost. 

To dance with what is left of our memories. To sway in place, or to walk away as though it never existed.

The past, it’s too painful to wear. 

The mind will forget, of course it will. We can make ourselves believe anything, can’t we? But our bodies hold on.

The body cannot fill up the space left in our hearts. We can close our eyes to it, and we can dance around it. We can even say I love you, again. But do we mean it?

How can we mean something we cannot feel?

Don’t it beat a slow dance to death?

Year 5. Everything has changed. But dancing with your ghost has brought me here. Here, to this moment. A quiet moment on a full moon, with a candle lit and chamomile tea beside me.

Knowing that our art was worth it.

Knowing that it was going to be the only way through.

The only way we were ever going to feel anything again.

Because no one was going to save us.

But we did it, Mom. I did it.

And I love you.

Emily