Oceans of heartbreak…and also hope  (In memoriam)

Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim. ~ Vicki Harrison

I have been debating about whether to write this at all and even more so if I should share it but I have found that journaling hasn’t been the help it normally is. I thought I was doing a good job with managing this and would be able to “fake it until I make it” but it’s become clear that strategy wasn’t working and that another course of action was needed.  And although I’m struggling on exactly what to say and write, I find myself slowly starting to feel a sense of calm and peace as I put this together.

I was just trying to mask the pain because I reasoned that I shouldn’t even be in mourning.  I have been wrestling with the idea that perhaps my sorrow isn’t even valid in some ways ~ but I realized that I needed to stop trying to justify it.    It exists because we existed and it doesn’t take away from what else existed.  Often times in life, things don’t always work out the way that we would have liked them to but that doesn’t mean that we should invalidate the past.  As you were definitely an important part of shaping who I am today and I want to pay tribute to that because you and we deserve it.

And it feels like maybe if I write this and send it out ~ that somewhere in the universe, this becomes part of our story and is interwoven into the fabric of all that was and all that will ever be and can be the ending that we couldn’t find here together in this life.  That when someone dies, not everything is taken with them because the memory of you still remains and the brightness of our love still shines.

Grief is a such funny, complicated thing as I think to myself: I wonder now if I’ll be able to see the oceans and not think of you?  It hits me to the core of my being that as I’ve traveled the world, I’ve seen that your eyes were as blue and deep and varied as the oceans.

Yes I know that your side of our story was much more romantic about how we met but it’s always been true that what struck me the most was how startling I found your eyes to be. Intensely clear and incredibly blue like the Bosporus on a sunny day in Istanbul ~ that was the color of your eyes on that day and both had the same enchanting effect on me. Despite my efforts to resist, I was drawn in and well the rest of history.

The hue that they would get when you would get excited about something or when you were being mischievous like the infectious, seductive blues of Italian Riveria or the Adriatic Sea (you would have appreciated how some Croatian kids convinced me to jump into the water even though I wasn’t wearing a swimsuit).

The deep and mysterious blue of the waters of the Galapagos ~ of course it would be like the color of your eyes when you wanted to learn all you could about unlocking the secrets of science, the world, the cosmos, the universe and me.

And the intensely dark inky blue when the sea is storming ~ the color of your eyes the last time we were together ~ there is part of me that is terrified by the ocean and maybe I was scared by the depths of what we had but especially what you felt…

Maybe you were right all along ~ and that somewhere in a parallel universe, things happened differently and we found our way and were able to set things right ~ in at least in that one place at that one time.  But I know that in this life and in this world, that you’ll always be part of me and I’ll forever be grateful that we locked eyes so long ago and your baby blue eyes pulled me in.  And that when I see the oceans that you’re still here ~ watching and waiting ~ and that we made it in some ways…I have learned that it’s helpful to remember in times like this that that the best thing we can do to honor someone is to figure out how to go on as there is hope and light and love still because there is still life for us| Rest in peace