Some General, Gentle, Grounding of Grief

        I've a lot of friends and whanau who have lost much, this past while. So since it's on my mind, I'll share something with you.

        Take this as you will.

        Just musing on some grief.
        I'm aware I'm not the only one who has ever done it.
        I guess you could say I've developed a process for it.
        Please pardon me if I've shared it before and forgotten.

        It just so happens I have a number of opportunities to open one box of it at a time, this time of year. Each is usually tucked carefully away in a box within a drawer in a cubbyhole; built into a shelf in the back of a closet in a room otherwise left alone at the end of a hallway; in a house at the end of a street wherein visits to each are few, though felt, and far-between; and must consist of airing out the stale, dusty rooms before it's comfortable enough to be fit for the endeavor; all within the chambers of my (metaphorical) heart.

        Seems this time of year I get them piled and stashed together in a larger batch than usual, which requires extra time and energy to sort out. Such timing. I guess there isn't really good timing for such things, though. The longer we live, the more we gain, and lose, which just adds to the collection. 

        And I'm not saying I necessarily recommend this style of processing, but it is the way I seem to have developed as a means of managing the stress that grief adds to life. In this way I am able to give dedicated thought and feelings to each, in turn, instead of allowing them all to overwhelm me, which they could so easily do. 

        And in all this time, with all this practice, I can't help but think that time isn't the healer people like to say it is: if we find our way through, we begin to heal ourselves. Time is merely a tool we use.

        New wounds mean more and longer moments of tending. I suppose that is simply the way of things? That is how living organisms find a way forward even in loss, or damage.  What else can we do? We must find a way to keep doing simply what living beings do: survive til we can heal enough we can visit those rooms comfortably enough to let in the air and gentle sunshine.

Survive, til we can live,

til we can find a means to thrive.

        It does require time, and other, healthy things. It might be the search for these things that can, "make or break us." So we get to choose if we will be brave enough to visit these things and let in the healing and light.

        Just a brief moment of introspection.

        Better days ahead, my friends!