Grief and Growth

“The boundaries that divide life and death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?” Edgar Allen Poe

I didn’t feel like writing this week, but I haven’t really felt like doing much of anything. After losing Mom, I spent hours and days deciding on the words I wanted to share at her memorial last weekend. And now, I just want to go dormant. Despite my tendency toward shame for “nonproductive” days—I’ve taken a couple of long, glorious naps. They have felt sacred and restorative. The space between life before and after having a mom is hard to fathom. The chasm in my depths so wide, it’s like my soul is resting up for the longest journey. My blueprint for being Moms’s daughter and caregiver is now obsolete. And in order to draw up new plans I’m readying for that all-consuming foray into hidden corridors, long covered in dust and web. Rooms full of untouched joys, unexplored paths, and plans that were abandoned when I was needed elsewhere.

Inspiration always flickers on my walks through the trees and in the sun. Surrounded by all the dead and newly sprouting things, I can hear notes of grief and growth, simultaneously—life above ground and below. Sadness and hope are mingling in quiet chaos, just like the leafless old oak trees with their beautiful bent limbs reaching for the sky. And although the pull of my mother drew many of my roots to her side—this newfound freedom means my darkest depths are stirring, and ground is breaking in new and unfamiliar places. So I’ll go ahead and let my rooted Self rest, slowly finding its way through darkness of earth. But I’ll also put one foot in front of the other, lift my head to sun and sky…. to this overwhelming “open concept.” Although it’s daunting, there it is: life without borders, beautifully painted with hope and possibility.