Little Things

            The house has been filled with anxiety. It wraps around the doors and windows like holiday lights; it is bright enough to read by.

Crossword Doodle 2011

Time creeps up on Bryan with padded feet. He is afraid his everyday will creep on the same, noiseless tread. The stealth with which his middle age has reached him undoes him. It unravels his projects and lists of things to do. Despite my protests that life is an uphill tread to a finish where the journey is everything, he remains goal oriented. He is always working toward an achievement. I admire his tenacity.

But the smallest things disturb his peace of mind. A flutter in the heart makes him fearful that the shadows of death are waiting behind him always, just to the left of his vision. This peripheral phantom haunts his days and nights, until he begins to make lists that never come to fruition. He obsesses over all the Little Things that bring on the assailants of depression.

He is scared to die.

I’ve noticed that he focuses on the small stuff that turn fixation into a complex ballet on the edge of neurosis. I am no less faulty, but most of the time I am skewed into spazz attacks for entirely different reasons. Perhaps since, in my body, I hold all the mechanics of life, I am less likely to shun the vehicles of death. Perhaps because I’ve already dived my death and I am still standing, it makes me more likely to celebrate the tiny diversities of living in this world, rather than becoming immersed in their potential dangers. To me, death is just another glib remark from my accidental existence. Whatever my reason, I still watch my lover struggle with his mortality in all the small ways.

It’s always the Little Things.

So I have been pulling on my support hats, and wearing them as best I can while he frets and worries. I bite my tongue and watch my tone of voice. I make suggestions when he says he needs a project. I try to make living easy.

It is not so much a burden when I am stable and my meds are holding me up in their firm hands. I have floaties in this deep water, but it still hurts to watch Bryan tread tirelessly through it. All I can do is offer a hand.

And pay attention to the Little Things.