11 Days After The Funeral

Pain, God, and Minecraft

11 days after the funeral. I am finally back in LA. I felt so guilty leaving my parents to come back here. It was so painful to leave them. But I know I have to get my life started again. Tomorrow I will do my first show since the night RJ died. I don’t know what it will feel like or if I will be funny since I am a completely different person now. Profoundly, fundamentally different. I know he was always so proud I followed my dream but doing anything is so hard without him. Even eating (my literal favorite thing). Easter was so painful. It felt wrong. We went to the beach and being at the beach for the first time genuinely took my breath away. It physically hurt me. And my whole family. RJ was a big surfer and would spend hours in the ocean. I associate every beach with him. Every first without him feels like getting kicked in the stomach. I miss him so much I listened to the six voicemails I have of his today. I wish I had 1000000. How can he be gone? He was just here. He was supposed to always be here. We are not complete without him. He’s our Arge. Our north star, genuinely.

I worry nobody wants to hear about this any more (I haven’t even seen anyone yet lol). I am not comfortable being sad girl publicly. I am used to being a professional clown and crossing my eyes at people. I worry this will derail my entire career. I worry the rug will be ripped out from under me at any given time in general now. I worry about a lot of things. I worry about what to share and what not to share to respect RJ, my family, and myself. But here I am again writing out of survival and hopefully to help even one person feel less alone in their grief or pain. I have no choice but to be fully human right now. I’m so raw that picking which sides of myself to share in public is a thing of the past. I am in full surrender.

I just got home from Rosebud’s airbnb that she got right by my apartment in LA. She flew here to be with me in between SNL, Dallas, and Baltimore this weekend. Andy and Minnow, too. I’m so lucky. Well, not in some ways lol. But to have been going through life with Rosebud for over a decade now — open mics, breakups, rejections, awards, illness, surgery, jobs, a baby, traveling to so many places together, and now death. Bizarre that God gave me a best friend who has also dealt with the excruciating loss of a sibling. I guess he (she?) knew we needed each other. ***If you’re reading this God, I’m extremely ticked off at you right now, so please skip over that compliment, it’s not for your omniscient ass eyes.

Now I will tell you about a few good things. (I will also continue to reiterate that I compulsively use incomplete sentences and will not proofread this post before publishing). Can you imagine how brave knowing that any suitor can find this substack in one cursory google search for all eternity? I know my husband is near. And that I won’t have to prove that I’m smart or without (several) flaws for him to like me. Because I am simply enough because I exist. Right? I don’t know. Who cares. Oops, I forgot I was writing about good things.

Okay a few good things —

• I saw Minecraft with my nephew and it was so radical!!! It made me so happy. I loved all their giant square heads. I didn’t even know I liked square heads before this. Jack Black is incredible. What a gift to the world. He makes me so happy, he is so jubilant! Totally righteous! Sometimes I see him on my walking route in LA. He’s always alone wearing tie dye and a backpack. I take each sighting as a good omen. My dream is to have acting roles like Jack Black and Melissa McCarthy. I feel that’s what I was put here to do. Maybe you can work on that one, God, since you know what you did. And how about before RFK Jr. puts me in a camp for being autistic while you’re at it, chop chop. RJ would have loved Minecraft and taking his kids to see it. Right up his alley. Boo.

• I got a new geriatric night gown. It’s so cute and grandma like and also kind of very Wendy from Peter Pan. I have reached my final form.

• Rosebud’s daughter climbed in my lap during one of my favorite Pixar films, the illustrious Cocoa. She laughs so much it heals me.

• My 97-year-old building manager brought me a ziplock bag of chocolates and told me I shouldn’t be sad because I’m pretty. Huge win for me. We’re on the board, guys.

• Being with my family. I love them so much.

• Being with my friends who feel like family. I spent a little time with our friends, the Wally’s, as we call them last weekend. They make me feel safe in the world. And laugh with me and cry with me. And really all the amazing friends who have checked in and held me up. This is how I know God is real. The love that people have shown me at my lowest. It makes me cry. Everything makes me cry.

• Talking to some of RJ’s friends. Talking to his friends makes me feel close to him. I never want to stop talking about him ever. I’ve bonded with friends of his I’ve never even met. RJ brings everyone together.

• I met the sweetest dog in the world. It was like our souls recognized each other. Yes, I did get hives on my entire body but it was completely worth it. And yes, if you are a suitor reading this, I do have animal allergies but enough awareness to be humiliated by them and enough grit and gladiator lion heart to still snuggle every animal even though it causes me grave harm.

• My therapist, Catie. Shout out, Catie. U da man, Catie. For real for real. Best therapist in the world.

• Strawberry vanilla olipop

• I listened to the audiobook, Signs, by Laura Lynne Jackson. Multiple people recommended that I read it. It’s by a psychic medium and each chapter is about how a lost loved one uniquely communicated from the other side after their passing. I found it very comforting and will now probably spend all my spare time trying to become a medium so I can talk to RJ. Suitors are very scared now. Who cares about you, suitors? This isn’t for you, it’s private. Stop googling me. I don’t google you. I keep begging for RJ to come to me in a dream. I hope he does soon.

Anyway, I have several shows this week. It’s go time with my tour starting May 9th. I’ll be coming to Denver, Missouri, Seattle, Sacramento, San Francisco, Portland, Dallas, and probably more cities after that (tickets and info at punchup.live/blairsocci). My dad told me I need to channel RJ and how silly we were together when I get back on stage. I pray people will come to my shows even though I am experiencing very horrific human shit right now. Maybe it will feel amazing. My purpose in life is to help others now more than ever even if it’s with a small, dumb laugh. And to talk more about mental health even if it’s very scary for me.

Thanks for reading, love you.

B