As we all come to this 15th anniversary, I find myself less on words and in deep quietness seeing this many years have gone by. Grief is a long journey that you really don't have any idea about. You just feel your way along each day and week and month and year as it goes by...anniversaries and birthdays and special "Just to me days" find me remembering...as I am sure everyone who loved and knew you also does.
I was writing in my morning pages and realized that part of the wordlessness I feel is that the container I had for this journey of loss is out of letters to form words..inside the container, there are broken letters and just a few at the bottom of my heart to form new and meaningful words to speak my heart at 15 years...it is like an almost empty box of alphabet cereal---just a few letters and lots of dust and crumbs. Somehow it felt significant, as this year, in just a few weeks, we will place your ashes in Lakeview Cemetery--in a glassed in area--for others to see and visit. I am trying to find things to place in there with you...what in the world will those things be? So many of the little items I have are meaningful to me...our journey...help me Papa to find what will be there.
So, somehow it seems like a new time is beginning...a turn in this long road of grief...new discoveries...Fuller hope of heaven and resurrection...Missing you still fiercely...as many do.
I wish we could have gone to Italy...just to sit there. be very still. Your ashes will now be in Little Italy and others can visit you there...and sit and remember their own stories with you. I'm so glad you have impacted so many on the way...your love for life--your passion for adventure and love and each thing you loved...so impactful.
Just miss you my girl. Each day is closer to seeing the fullness of what you already know.
My words are few, my heart is still living with courage. Thankful for the ones I travel this journey with...my Rick, my family, my dear friends...so blessed.
But it still catches my breath, knowing that it is now 15 years. too long.
