I was not afraid of dying because I have lived.

Storm clouds pressed in the first few days. Low pressure aching and infecting. Rain showers off and on, working to erode or burn away the skin. Tight. Dried and drying then wet and stinging. They are less frequent now.

Descent into loneliness, the adjustment I underestimated. It is possible to return to times unchanged. This house mostly unchanged except for a few odd misplacements. A few things missing. Reminders that it is my house, but abandoned and other inhabitants making use of the possessions left behind in ways unappreciative or ignorant or out of disregard. Displacement.

I could not sleep but droned on in the aching fatigue, taking account of the household, of the resident.

In the afternoon I went out to the back porch where a little plastic Christmas tree hibernated through the summer in plastic sacks. Took off the top one, then pulled the tree by its topmost limb out of the bottom sack. Carried like so into the living room. Set it next to the antique Korean desk by the window and plugged it into the extension running out from behind the air conditioner. There. Decorated for the holidays.

[I remember the night last year - it might have been snowing - when Dave came in late from work. Sniffling, his cheeks and nose reddened from the bitter cold. He swung onto the ondol heated floor a little tree decorated carefully by the ajuma in her flower store on the other side of the park. Cost him more than it should’ve I guessed. He said he knew how important celebrations are to me and wanted to bring something more festive into the house. The holidays are lonely here.]

I wrapped the gift I brought and placed it with one other and a miniature chocolate Santa on the old desk by other gifts I presumed were for me.

Then he was home. We mobilized for going out this Eve. Walked out into the cold and down under into the subway where I pulled out the Chongekkwon I’ve been using to mark the tables in the back of my statistics book all these months. I fed it into the slot of the turnstile, which read it and discounted the fee residing on that little slip of paper -- all the misuse -- before spitting it back out for me to use yet again.

The Hard Rock café is where we went for Christmas Eve veggie burgers. It was full with smokers and young Koreans dropping money as if they were not in the worst economic crisis of the last half century. We had to pay a cover. We ate quickly and left.

I am still so tired. From the push and pull. From the gravity.