Croatia beats England 2-1 in overtime

I - okay, this is going to sound strange.  But you all know me - friends and family - did I - Rob, did we - did we have a sister?

I awoke from a deep sleep this morning - Sonya said she roused me a couple of times to make sure I was still alive, my breathing was so shallow, but I have no memories from my slumber.  When I roused I had a deep feeling of loneliness, of emptiness, of sorrow and mourning a loss, a feeling so deep that for a moment all I was inside was longing and missing, no personality, no Dave.

Her name was Abigail.  That was our sister's name.

But no - that's crazy, right?  This Cup is getting to me.  There's no records, what 'memories' I have are hazy, and I'm sure this is merely a product of my deranged psyche, overheated from the Cup's Dark Influences.

But in the break before overtime I had a vision, of Rob, ten years old, and our... our sister, thirteen.  She was still in her uniform from a game - must have been a Sunday afternoon - and we performed some - ritual, I guess.  Candles and a dissected rodent of some sort, out in the swamp.  The phrase 'two to succeed, one to feed'.  It was just a flash but resonated with my feeling when I awoke and I could barely sit through the rest of the game.

England scored in the fifth minute.  Croatia scored halfway through the second half, and then again partway through the overtime.  It was exciting, I suppose - I was only half-watching, and what I saw didn't really register.

I went to Mom's house after the game - I asked if the name Abigail was familiar, if we had any family by that name.  She made that face she makes when she thinks I'm teasing and said, "No - I don't think so - why do you ask?"  I said something about Facebook and then I went outside to watch Artemis jump on the trampoline.  When I went back five minutes later Mom was sitting in the chair, watching the news, a tear running down her cheek.  I left her be.

I am so tired.  So very tired and distraught.  I am trying to shake this off - I'm upset, clearly, and this is a part of my soul struggling to impose meaning, to fill in the blanks of a deep cavernous feeling with reason and structure, when the alternative is insanity and bleak.  People don't just vanish from the world, from memory, from any sort of artifact like pictures or the scrapbooks GJ keeps - and I checked.  It's a hallucination, it must be.  It must be.

I am so so very tired.  This is a difficult Cup.  I fear for my sanity - for my very soul - with the last two games.  The delay only seems to make it worse - but at this point I don't know what could mitigate this despair.

The next game is Saturday.  Belgium plays England for third.  One of them will win, I imagine.

On Sunday France and Croatia play the final for the Cup.

It can't come soon enough.  My next missive, if I am still able, will be after Saturday's game.

  -Dave


Mike commented:  Ive heard of this ritual before. I think you must have been the one to feed.