Cardboard Chickens

 Herself speaks.

We're approaching the holiday season, and I am in full flashback mode to last year's holidays. Right now, I contemplate Thanksgiving, which I spent with my mother and my father (for his very last Thanksgiving), away from Beloved Husband for the very first time in the thirty-plus years that we've been married (who had a lovely time for the holiday with his mother and one of his siblings and their family and Offspring the Third for the holiday). 

I don't know what to do with all the Grief that has bubbled back up. I didn't actually take care of the Feelings last year since there was so much more to come so there was no time to do anything except to box everything up and put it away for later, and now I am finding Feelings amidst the holiday decoration boxes and I am overwhelmed all over again, can I just box it all back up and pretend the Feelings don't exist? 

We all know that's unwise. Those boxes are going to come home to roost, square ugly cardboard metaphorical chickens of Sorrow and Grief and Anger and Loss and Loneliness, perched next to the Thanksgiving cornucopia, settled in on the Christmas tree branches, wearing New Year's hats. 

Help. 

So many cardboard chickens. 

I searched for "cardboard chicken" and found a YouTube tutorial for making a cardboard chicken mailbox. Maybe I should do this. If for no other reason than it will take my mind off of things for a few moments.