00059: Melancholy

Today I woke up feeling good. And then, suddenly, I just started crying. I know I’m happy but there are moments when I simply start to cry out of the blues. I have been dealing with a lot since October 2020, since the moment I received the news about my best friend’s passing due to COVID19. And then, another friend, then acquaintances, and then more friends, and then family members. And of course, the Atlanta shooting trigger anger in me, because it is happening to yet another minority group or rather because it is happening. 

There are moments when I feel lonely. Those moments are very rare. But when it happens, I really feel them, and they are not fun at all. When I was younger, every time I felt like “exploding,” like I couldn’t make it anymore, every time I felt like I needed to purge my emotions, I watched the film The Color Purple. That film, like a Greek tragedy, would help me reach catharsis, making me cry during the film and after. A couple of hours later I would feel okay and move on with life. 

Later in life, when negotiating with my homosexuality, I was away from home, visiting a cousin who understood what I was going through. While at his place, I saw a film that totally destroyed me: Maurice. I cried so much because of that film that my cousin got worried, thinking I was going to do something selfish, like ending my life.

He didn’t need to worry though, because that facet in my life had already passed, I had already entertained and overcome the desire to “ended all.” I was now on a path to self-acceptance, and searching for the courage to come out to my family. Because of that film, I promised myself to never pretend to be anyone else but myself. I was not going to end up like Clive Durham (Hugh Grant), the character in the film who decided to get married, shutting the door on his male lover and forcing himself to suppress his real feelings, and by doing so, living an unhappy life.

I know that my melancholy today is not about me, per sei, but about the loss I’ve been experiencing. As I write this, I’m remembering how last night, during dinner, I admitted to my husband how I did not want to go out to eat to our favorite Italian restaurant, even though we could because of the new guidelines. I told him I couldn’t because that restaurant is the last place we all had dinner with my best friend Luis before he passed due to the virus. I am not ready to visit. I’m still hurting. I’m still in mourning.

Perhaps this is the reason why I’m crying right now. I mean, it has been 40 minutes and the tears have not stopped, even as I write this. I will get through it. I will make it to the end. I will be happier in the future. In the meantime I just need to breathe deeply and take life slowly, with caution, and one hour at the time. #carlosmanuelspeaksthetruth.