How are you... really?

Oh what I would give if someone would ask me how I am today.  But not in the way that we ask anyone we meet on any given day. I want them to ask me with the same sad bewildered eyes that they asked me with six months ago, meaning what they meant six months ago, when "how are you doing?" turned in to "how are you holding up?".  If someone would look at me and know now that asking me that same question could give them two very different possible answers, each as likely as the other, I would give them an honest answer today.

The answer was always "I'm alright." It always is, you know. If they're not 'alright', you don't see them. They don't see the light of day, they don't answer phones, they don't come in to work. If they've gathered themselves up enough to make it out to where you can ask them that question, they give you a default answer so they don't have to tell you the truth or risk a conversation about how it happened.  Never has a co-worker asked a colleague how they were holding up after bereavement leave and gotten a blank stare from blood shot eyes and tear stained cheeks. If we've made it in to work, we're not going to fall apart now.

But now, six months later,  someone asking me that question is all I need, some one really asking me that question. I'm all right. Life is a mess. Relationships are brutal and strenuous. I have no idea how crying on my co-worker didn't make our relationship awkward as the waiting room for hell, but I'm so thankful it didn't, and I know I can't tell him that or it would be. I'm constantly torn between wanting to live a better life and just enjoying what I have here and now, and overall, I'm alright. I'm laughing again and not feeling too guilty about it. 

I want them to ask me again, with that same concerned half pitying look, because my loss isn't any less today than it was then, but now I can give them an honest answer and I want to rejoice for that.