I was hoping the holidays would offer a bit of distraction from what's going on in the rest of my life. I work at UPS and historically what we refer to as "peak season" ends up consuming my waking world from the week of Thanksgiving until a couple weeks after New Year at minimum. There's no time to really think about too much else since I'm at work from around 8 PM most nights until roughly 10 AM-Noon the next day. This has so far not been the case. Now I'm just mentally and physically drained in addition to the emotional turmoil of these past few weeks.

I'm trying to get back up and start moving forward again. I know the world around me is continuing on, and it isn't going to stop just because I'm in agony. The largest issue I've been having is being able to focus. I ended up working 17 hours the Friday after thanksgiving, and I know at least an hour or two of that was because I was struggling so hard to keep my brain on task. I'm grateful to be in the same position at work as I have been for a handful of years; I don't think I could handle any more new ground right now.

The other issue following behind in a close second: identity. Who am I now? What am I now? I spent the evening of the month anniversary of the fire with close friends. I ordered dinner for everyone from the same place Madelaine and I had the last night we had together, and we watched Barbie (she loved that movie). There were a lot of little moments through the movie that brought tears, but I expected that going in since it was a movie she really enjoyed that we had seen together. I wasn't expecting the portions with Ken toward the end hitting me so hard as they did: It's Barbie and Ken? Who is Ken without Barbie? Just typing that out right now my mind is doing the conversion and I'm tearing up: Who is Will without Madelaine?

Generally speaking, I've liked who I am these past few years more than I have at any other time in my life. I look back at the journey getting here and cringe at what I thought was acceptable behavior. I had one of my best friends recently say they remember me before Madelaine; that I'm better than I was back then. They're right. These weren't changes made for her; they were changes for myself that were inspired by her.

I want to keep being the person she loved. Anything less than that feels like it would be irreverent to her memory and the love she filled my life with.