The Wall

The hardest part of the day is often right after bedtime. You’d think it would be easier once the noise stops. Sometimes it is, for like four seconds. Then the silence gets loud. All day I’m needed in obvious ways. Questions, snacks, homework, rides, conflict resolution, random kid chaos. There’s no room to fall all the way into the grief because the pace won’t allow it. At night the pace drops. And there it is. The empty space where conversation used to live. The bed with too much absence in it. The instinct to debrief with someone who no longer exists. The awareness that whatever I’m carrying from the day has nowhere to go but deeper into me. So bedtime isn’t closure. It’s exposure.