Reconcile
From Chapter 7
A need to reconcile lies deep within me. To write things out, to understand, to learn, and then accept. Over the years some things cannot be reconciled. They swirl in my head, my heart, and back to my head. They rumble and stir in my core. It is hard to find joy when I have expected to reconcile and am left with fragments. The fragments of our memories come sharp at times. For me, they come with bewilderment. Loss and decisions, conscious or subconscious linger. Some may haunt. Knowing things are not as they always seem, it still takes me back when I see others on track and digging in. A couple that has managed to maneuver past 20 years of marriage smarts a little. A friend who took the traditional route with studies, experiencing college in late teens and early twenties helping to shape them can leave me with an envy. A few others continue to send shock waves in my most quiet times. Like the startle sometimes right before we find sleep.
I wonder what it is like for those that have a path and stay on it--do they find contentment in life or yearn for different or more as I continue to? I know now that my yearning has very little to do about the others in my life and all about my make up - my psyche. I often feel that I am a late bloomer in choosing the right partner, finding the right career, and setting life goals. Never wavering. I wonder now if others feel like I do, choosing to take long mountain roads with the windows down to smell the forest and maybe even missing a planned event. A road with unexpected curves and sometimes takes as sharp of turns as I have.
Over the first several years after grief, I missed many events. Already shy to attend memorials or funerals, I missed almost every one. The death of my stepmother first and then my Father, left it all painful and open to attend. I often felt I could not leave the boundaries of my home. Although I did, if just to prove I could, but to hide at home or far away was my comfort. I missed meaningful events. A best friend’s father’s memorial. A man who meant a great deal to me.
Something shifted later on as I now won’t miss any memorial I am included in. Knowing how much it meant to me for others to attend both of my Stepmom and Father in just months of one another. I go out of my way to show up, in the back usually paying respects and wanting different for others.
My winding path has led me to the one-two punch at times. Some unconscious choices made by knee jerk decisions, some unplanned grief, well thought out decisions, and knee jerk reactions. The one-two punches a reminder to stop and take it in. The reminder: Not all is healed yet. The expectation that healing will somehow fill what once did not need filling. The effort to make new again what we didn’t realize had been tarnished. And yet all that is meant is I am to feel. All of it. Celebrate this gift to feel so deeply.
