A friend of mine’s dad used to say that there’s always room for jello because it fits between the cracks.
As time goes on, I think of grief in very much the same way. It just seems to slide between my ribs, and find a place in my heart no matter how full I am. It has become the jello’d seafloor spreading between the tectonic plates of my emotions. The griefquakes don’t seem to get any better, and don’t seem to happen any less, but I’m learning how to architect my foundations in different ways, so that I sway instead of shatter.
This time of year can be especially riotous. Be gentle with yourself. Stronger foundations are inevitable– resilience is a basic building block of humanity– but nothing was ever built in a day.
Be gentle with the people around you. They could be crumbling, and still smile, and still show up to work, and still dance. They could be full of feelings that seem contrary to it– but grief, like jello, will still find a way to slip between the cracks.
I don’t know how many of the followings posts are about the architecture of my ribbing, versus how many are about the things that slid past my foundations, but I hope you find something of value in here that helps you handle your jello, on the griefquake days.
- 8. assembling grace (11/8/2022)
- salute (8/19/2022)
- beauty marked (8/5/2022)
- 2/22/22 (2/20/2022)
- grief is (10/13/2021)
- blank (5/4/2021)
- on grief-dimmed joys (4/22/2021)
- the scream (3/23/2021)
- lilliputian logs (3/19/2021)
- salting this year (3/15/2021)
- dialects (3/3/2021)
- witness (2/22/2021)
- measures (11/14/2020)
- lockdown mouse (11/10/2020)
- regathering (11/4/2020)
- floof (10/14/2020)
- being excellent to each other (9/15/2020)
- podcast: forgiveness, etc (9/2/2020)
- G4: a new chapter (8/8/2020)
- honoring the glitch (6/20/2020)
- journal: tables & cages (4/10/2020)
- poem: if the only prayer (4/8/2020)
- a gift (4/5/2020)
- how (4/4/2020)
- today i can (3/18/2020)
- 2019: erosion (12/28/2019)
- poem: shall pass (12/18/2019)
- grief: uncle rudy (12/3/2019)
- grief stumblingstone: goodbye from space (11/9/2019)
- poem: spoon by spoon (11/4/2019)
- trauma: hippostarfish (10/16/2019)
- on the backs of selfies (3/19/2019)
- basic blues and golden deliciousness (2/25/2019)
- clean air (11/30/2018)
- lucky me (11/22/2018)
- flowers and stars (11/21/2018)
- river-made woman (11/13/2018)
- fancy nights (11/9/2018)
- holding violets (11/6/2018)
- also. (11/3/2018)
- anniversaries and new years (5/8/2018)
- griefjoy (3/4/2018)
- 1000 days (1/29/2018)
- like candy (1/25/2018)
- puppet normal (1/16/2018)
- grease unspoken (1/10/2018)
- ❤ (11/2/2017)
- oh nothing (8/30/2016)
- i waxed my face, and you’ll never believe what happened next. (6/12/2016)
- ungroomed grief (5/23/2016)
- all the little lights (3/14/2016)
- ❤melt : they open doors (1/2/2016)
- 2015, real talk. (12/31/2015)
- ❤melt : what if we fly? (12/11/2015)
- go ahead, clap your hands. (12/5/2015)
- ❤melt : calling on alex (11/22/2015)
- i’m on the brute squad. (11/20/2015)
- the funeral (11/11/2015)
- ❤melt : i was there (10/12/2015)
- when there is hurt (10/2/2015)
- #ALoveStory (9/14/2015)
- ❤melt : everything’s gonna be okay (8/31/2015)
- ❤melt: the simple truth (8/24/2015)
- where’re you goin’? (7/23/2015)
- this is not a test. (7/21/2015)