Catching up/40 days of grief

I tried to write about grief but words weren’t enough.

I tried to write about grief and got tangled in too many metaphors.

I tried to write about grief and my shadow swallowed me whole.

I tried to write about grief and started running.

Grief, a tender extension of our loss. Grief to me is desperately longing to move on and feeling guilty for pushing it away. Grief to me is googling “how long is it normal to feel this way”, alongside associated searches such as: “What are the 7 stages of grief? What does grief do to your body? “ And “can one die of grief?” in order to check my "progress". Grief to me is seeking bandages in the form of shit TV, YouTube rabbit holes, and getting obsessed with something really niche and a bit weird, baking ASMR for instance. Grief to me is so sticky, dynamic and complicated that I tend to avoid it altogether.

My mother is from an Islamic family and for her, the loss of life is followed by a 40 day ceremony. Gatherings of people who pray together, eat together, mourn, celebrate and honor the life lost. I don’t follow Islam myself, however I’m of the belief that energy doesn’t dissipate, but is passed on or transformed. Disappointment into resentment, or stress into inflammation so when invited to hold space for grief, I decided to stop running. I owe myself a gentle unpacking of my grief. Taking influence from my heritage I spent 40 days following the grief gathering to honor loss, this came in the form of reflective writing, walks, and play. I’ve shared some of these reflections below.

40 days of grief

Day 1: I speak about grief with strangers and old friends. Crying the tears I held for a decade.

Day 3: Wearing the coolest sunglasses I own, paired with a long trench like you used to. Feeling like us.

Day 10: I go to the shops to look for tea lights to burn in your honor, the ones I like were sold out. Instead, I think about the collection of homemade candles I have tucked away in a drawer, my whoopsie stash. They're either too melty, too chipped or too lopsided for you. I think about candles, but burn
none.

Day 19: The sudden loss of a cousin. He was 21. I wail in my kitchen.

Day 20: I'm trying to say something to him, to his mother, to his sister. Nothing is ever enough. I write but I don't call anyone, and writing like this feels so transactional. I'm searching for that touch of warmth reserved for birthday cards, the soft well wishes, the gratitude, the settling presence that flows through you as you celebrate another year of their survival. Here it goes:

Hey J,

I'm sorry we haven't spoken in so long.

I should have seen you more, at least I would have known if blue was still your favourite colour, or what makes you laugh and if you were happy with yourself. I'm grateful to have shared time and space with you.

Thank you.

Wishing you a good goodbye.

Day 21: A loss in the community. Someone I knew through the nod of a head, a smile across the room, a conversation about dreams, art, and design. He will be greatly missed.

I think about my own mortality, what they will write in their captions when I'm gone. My love, my hopes, my legacy, severed. The raw ends of ribbons. I am not afraid.

Day 24: I write about my dad

Christmas eve would have been your birthday. My sister and I spent each of the 10 years since your passing acknowledging each one. Brushing over the feelings each year until they faded into the most delicate of watercolours. This year, neither of us said anything at all.
Instead we shared gratitude, that we could be together healthy and strong.

Day 26:
Having that unfeeling feeling,
I’m trying to turn into myself
Knocking on doors to empty houses
Wondering where did everyone go?

Day 27: Today has to be the day I speak to my cousin, his sister. Tell her I'm sorry for what happened, tell her I'm sorry it hurts and that it will hurt always.
- grief sits within me like held breath.

Day 30: I dream I'm climbing up a staircase that seems to never end. It's cold concrete like the stairwell in an estate, dark but for the safety lights. I’m dressed like I'm going to a 90's cocktail party, in a fuschia satin dress to the knee and forest green mid heel with a square toe. My sweat creates crescents under my arms as I climb up and up and up. A smudged red lip, eyes wet and leaking mascara down my face I climb, round and round, dragging along this heavy red plastic bag, the contents important yet unknown. Up and up. Endlessly, like a sad santa. Until I get to the top.

There is a door with no handle, so I kick it open and with its swing a strong wind seems to lift me by my chin. Straightening my spine, a loose thread pulled taught. I look around to find that I'm at the top of what feels like the tallest building in the world.
I'm relieved.
I release my hand from the bag of something, nothing, everything and I fall.
And as I fall, I rest.

I don't wake up when I hit the ground, instead I cautiously pull myself up by the handle of the door in front of me and open it, it leads me to the bottom of the staircase. The bag is there, no heavier, no lighter, I dust off and start again.
climb and climb
and drag and climb
and sweat and fall
to climb again.

Day 34:
Redemption arc
How much can you give before it becomes transactional?
How much can you love beyond condition?
What is the distance between sacrifice and compromise?
How long will you sob ahead of practicing gratitude?
How heavy is the chest before you allow yourself to let go of guilt?

How much did he give, before it was transactional? Which branch snapped to uproot the tree?
Was it the money, the time or the responsibility?
How much could he love if I were too demanding, too talkative, too much?
Which parts of you did you leave behind for us? Did you resent us for it?
Did our warmth singe his edges, or was our joy too fleeting?
Were we only enough at arms length?
How heavy is the chest before I let go of this guilt?

Day 37:
I'm reflecting on T I M E
Quality time
Respecting my time
Valuing my time
Wasting time
Cherishing time
Needing more time
Running out of time
Pace

Day 39:
I take a walk in a gentle rain listening to my favourite artist. Although I’m in a heavy aching state, I am grateful for another day.

I’m not sure how to close something that feels like a lifelong process. I am learning to honor loss in small ways, integrating my loss through daily practice, gratitude, music and clothing. It’s brought me a lot of warmth and maybe even improved my relationship with death. Living with depression, death can sometimes feel so painfully close. Leaving feels so easy when you’re numb to the little pleasantries of life, and running hasn’t done much but make me tired, so I’ll stop and rest and play that song I know he’ll like. I like it too.

I tried to run from grief and found this game about saying goodbye.

I tried to run from grief and found this webcomic about longing and avoidance.

I tried to run from grief and played this song over and over.

I tried to run.