There’s a numbness that feels like it isn’t numb. I will be going about my business, helping Mike with his rehab, tucking the kids into bed, taking notes on a Teams meeting with doctors or nurses wearing what I assume is a smile on my face. I will be answering emails, or figuring out what load of laundry I need to clean, and all the while there’s this quiet whisper in my ear, You know Shana is dead, and you’re going about your business, right? Your sister is dead. You’re never going to see her again. You’re never going to talk to her again. And you’re going about your business?

As if I have a choice.

The last picture I took of her alive. One of my kids was taller than her. The others were so excited to get taller than Aunt Shana, too.

It’s my birthday today. I was eighteen months younger than Shana two weeks ago. Am I the oldest now? Or do I have to wait another birthday-and-a-half to claim that title from her? We were so competitive in so many ways. I fought my whole childhood for everything she had, by right of being the oldest or through being the smartest or just by being so damned determined in everything. If she isn’t aging anymore, I am rapidly catching up on those eighteen months. They seemed less important every year, anyway, but they have grown over these last two weeks. Their days are legion.

I think about throwing myself a Zoom karaoke birthday party. All my friends, sitting in their own homes, singing along to karaoke tracks on youtube… it could be so much fun. And then that little voice in my ear, Planning a birthday party? Two weeks after your sister died? Shana was a blast at karaoke. The two of you could have done Amy Winehouse together. She’d have laughed so hard.

I wonder if Passover will always mean that Shana is dead. If my birthday will always mean that Shana is dead. If everything I ever did with he will hurt me forever. If I will ever manage to make another brisket.

There’s a disassociation that isn’t dissociative. I will be sitting across the table from Mike as he reads jokes or memes or news aloud from his phone, and I’m not there. I am there, I am physically there, I am emotionally there. But I’m not. I’m a million miles away, not even thinking about Shana, sometimes, just… not there. I’m tired, all the time. And I can’t sleep. And I’ve got this stye I’m dealing with, no doubt from rubbing my eye so much through all the crying. I should have accepted a kleenex, but it keeps me tethered a little. Something physically hurts. It helps.

The days are so long, and they go so fast, and I have done nothing. There is so, so much that needs to be done.

The three Borenstein girls, two or three years ago

There’s a flavor to my grief, like Meyer lemons. Bittersweet, acidic, addictive. I keep slipping back in it, sucking on more of it, even though it stings and sickens.

As I was falling asleep the other night, I imagined Shana talking to our mother. In the way of half-asleep people, I could tell what they were talking about but I couldn’t hang onto the words, Shana was worrying about me, which I thought was sweet. She was worrying about how much I had to carry, and she wanted to offer to help, and in the self-martyring way I have of doing such things I wanted to tell her she didn’t need to trouble herself and that I would take care of things myself, and then I remembered that she was dead and my mother was not here and I had to take care of things myself anyway, and I couldn’t go to sleep.

I had heard her voice so clearly in my ears. I heard her saying things I desperately wanted to believe she said when she thought I couldn’t hear. And as I closed my eyes and tried to pick out the words, I realized I would never hear her say something new, ever again.

Her voice, lisping and rough around the edges, lilting and somehow also gutteral, is as gone as the rest of her.

I wish I knew what she said. I wish I knew what she would say now.

Here she is making breakfast after the family Channukah party, in my kitchen

There is disbelief, but I believe it. I know it’s real, but my brain can’t seem to accept it. She isn’t supposed to be gone. She was done being gone. She was present, and affectionate, and she and I still didn’t get along perfectly but we were sisters. It’s okay to not get along perfectly with your sisters. Until it’s not.

I can’t handle my kids bickering. I hear them prod at each other in the bored way of siblings trapped in a house when the weather is turning nice and there’s nowhere to go and not enough to do, and I envy them, and I have no patience for it.

What I wouldn’t give to bicker one last time. What I wouldn’t give to have remembered every time I saw her how grateful I was to have a sister who didn’t get along with me perfectly. What I wouldn’t give to hear her tell me I’m being overly sentimental and twee.

Her vocabulary would be better.

There’s a regret that isn’t regret. I don’t know what it is, yet.

Maybe it’s only grief.

Her obituary is here: https://www.mykeeper.com/profile/ShanaBorenstein/ If you knew her, please feel welcome to leave stories about her, pictures of her, anything. We miss her dearly, and every remembrance warms our hearts.

Fury: Women’s Lived Experiences in the Trump Era is out now!

You can read a long-ago blog post about my childhood memories with my older sister here: Good Night, You Moonlight Ladies

Read my most recent post here: An Unfiltered and Exhausted Reflection on My Recently Deceased Sister

If you’re social, follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram!

Type your email address in the box and click the “create subscription” button. My list is spam-free, and you can opt out at any time.