Sorrow

"When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight." 

-Kahlil Gibran 

My dear friend and her husband are heartbroken. I cannot share details right now as I respect their privacy. But I do want to write about this because it is affecting me as well. I am grieving too. Grief is personal, and yet, it is still grief, and it is impossible to not feel.

I wish there was something I could do to carry some of the pain they are feeling. But all I can do now is send them my love and pray for them. No one should ever have to go through what they are going through...

Since hearing the news on Friday, I have been pacing, literally and figuratively. I feel helpless, as I am not sure how or what to do. One moment I want to rush to her and hug her tight and the next I know I need to stay back and wait until she is ready.

I have found some helpful resources, but the reality is that no one has ever written about my friend, so this will just have to unfold...and hopefully I am as prepared as possible...

But no one can prepare you for the emotions you feel when you lose someone loved. Yet, when they hit, you can't help but feel like life is that much more real, and not real, in a way. And it forces you to look at your life...at your mistakes...at your successes...and in a way it all seems trivial...except for those you love. They are never trivial. But somehow are taken for granted sometimes, and they should never be.

This experience has shaken me out of whatever emotional and psychological rut I was in. I wasn't even aware I was in a rut. But aren't we often in a rut, somehow? It has opened me eyes even more and flooded my heart and reminded me that life is something wonderful, beautiful and yet so fragile...that the people I love are truly gifts, blessed am I to have them in my presence...and I want to live each day telling them how much I love them and how much more joyful my life is with them in it...

I do not know what lies ahead, but I do know sorrow has touched and changed me somehow.