No More Dancing Feet

Something is going on with me. What? I am not sure.
I wake up in a pool of sweat, often in the middle of the night, and during the day I have very little energy. It is as if someone pulled my plug, and I am running on low battery.

I know menopause has her bony toe in my door, attempting to begin pushing it open. That would explain the night sweats. But why didn't this happen a few months ago, when I was avoiding carb overload and doing such a great job controlling myself?

I eat healthfully in the morning, and by evening, the Carb Monster shows up, demanding to be fed, like the grotesque Little Shop of Horrors plant.

When it rumbles, "Feed me!" I go on autopilot.

And, no, I still have not brushed the dust off my hoop, nor done anything more with my me time than lie around, or sit here, watching Michael Jackson videos and reading biographies and magazines about him. At times I think I'm over his death, and a few hours later, here I am, crying over some rare little sun-breaks-through-clouds smile he gave during an award show or interview.

Why?

After over a month of feeling like a fool, I think I've finally figured out what's happening to me. I think somewhere deep inside, I am feeling as if Michael Jackson's death is the slow beginning of the end for me. A vibrant, talented person who was always somewhere out there during my entire lifetime is now gone, lying in a refrigerator at Forest Lawn Cemetery. His lightning-fast dancing feet have been stilled, his unmistakable voice, silenced.

He is not coming back. Ever.

I realize I am not only mourning and grieving for Michael Jackson.

Oh, no, it's so much more.

I am grieving for the younger me.

The one who's never coming back.