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JULY Real grief is not healed by time…If time does anything, it deepens our grief The longer we live, the more fully we become aware of who she was for us, and the more intimately we experience what her love meant for us Real, deep love is, as you know, very unobtrusive, seemingly easy and obvious, and so present that we take it for granted Therefore, it is often only in retrospect—or better, in memory—that we fully realize its power and depth Yes, indeed, love often makes itself visible in pain —HENRI NOUWEN At first this is frightening Grief deepening? Am I never going to feel better? So much of the meaning of our loved one’s life becomes distilled, sifted through memory and through experience after his or her death New insights awaken, new appreciations, and with these come new birth pangs, and new yearnings that our beloved was still with us But this ongoing process also promises that, in a way, loved ones will never leave us, that their lives will continue to nourish and, yes, change us—that they will, indeed, be with us always in the mutual interdependence of love My loved one will be with me in these bittersweet moments of deepening relationship JULY 10 I am slowly, painfully discovering that my refuge is not found in my mother, my grandmother, or even the birds of Bear River My refuge exists in my capacity to love If I can learn to love death then I can begin to find refuge in change —TERRY TEMPEST WILLIAMS At first it seems a preposterous suggestion—“learn to love death”? Death, which most of the time, to most of us, seems The Enemy? Perhaps what we are being asked to do—sensitized as we are by our grief—is to love The Truth, to love all that is So, from full hearts, perhaps we can include in the sweep of our love even that which has caused us great pain If we can, then we can stop being imprisoned behind walls of denial and anger; we can stop banging our heads and our hands against what cannot be changed We can accept what has happened, and relish the life that we have I will try to open my hands—and my heart—to life as it is now JULY 11 Hikers refer to them as “middle-miles.” These are the most exhausting, challenging miles on the path, when the exhilaration of beginning the journey has evaporated into drudgery and the promise of the path’s end has not yet given new energy for the stepping —HENRY E WOODRUFF The journey through grief is very different from the climb up a heroic mountain Yet there are stages of that ascent which remind us of our own climb out of the valley of despair In the early days and weeks of our grieving we usually have much to help us—the solicitude of friends, the gathering around of our religious community, the profferings of help Then we are in for the long haul, when we are at least as sad but more on our own We wonder whether we shall ever feel our old energy and hunger for life again We observe that people who have been grieving feel better We are told we will, too, and in our heads maybe we believe it But the days and weeks drag on and we don’t see any infusion of light and joy Like the climbers in the “middle-miles,” we must keep going, knowing that one day we will get on top of our lives again Looking back, we’ll marvel at how far we’ve come I believe in the top of the mountain even when I can’t see it JULY 12 Grief teaches the steadiest minds to waver —SOPHOCLES Don’t we know it! Sometimes we can’t seem to decide the simplest thing Or we decide and then agonizingly reflect on the decision: was it wise? We rename all the alternatives, chasing them around as though the decision were not already irrevocably made It’s no wonder Our world has become suddenly disordered by the death of our loved one, so why wouldn’t disorder spread over everything else? The wonder is that we are able to act systematically about anything, not that we occasionally get confused This will pass, of course We will begin to feel grounded again In the meantime, we can accept this time of flux and try to postpone major decisions—or get friends to consult with us about them In the early stages of grief is no time to sell the house or decide on a major vocational change! Of course my mind sometimes plays tricks on me I’ll regain my steadiness and good sense after a while JULY 13 He’d begun to wake up in the morning with something besides dread in his heart Not happiness exactly, not eagerness for the new day, but a kind of urge to be eager, a longing to be happy —JON HASSLER It comes upon us so gradually that we scarcely recognize the change—this moving out of the valley of despair, where the future looks perpetually grim, into a more pleasant land Then one day we may think to ourselves, Wait a minute This feels different! For now, instead of a sorrowful landscape marked by only occasional moments of happiness, we realize we inhabit a land where we are happy and content more of the time than not The periods of desolation are now the exception, not the rule Without knowing it, we have slipped into a new country This will take some getting used to Of course we’ll have relapses, which are really not relapses at all but a way of continuing to deepen the grooves in the brain that tell us who we are, now that our loved one has gone But the shift is a matter for astonishment and gratitude, and sometimes for a quiet waiting to see what other wisdom and selfknowledge may come to us I welcome, as a blessing from my loved one, the return of light and joy to my life ... change! Of course my mind sometimes plays tricks on me I’ll regain my steadiness and good sense after a while JULY 13 He’d begun to wake up in the morning with something besides dread in his
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