I’ve been to a lot of places in the last two years.
Places that were so grand you could practically smell the distinct scent of money wafting in the air. I never thought air could feel pretentious, but it did in some of the places I’ve passed through. I’ve been to places that felt like I was back home. Normal houses filled with normal people seemingly stacked on top of each other. Congested neighborhoods with kids playing in yards and people laughing on porches. I’ve seen towns that had an air of freedom to them, small towns where everyone knew everyone. Where dirt roads were common, and the houses were so far apart, it made me wonder how people could live there and not feel alone.
I crossed state lines. Got familiar with different accents from different parts of the country. I met nice people, rude people, funny people, andpeople that I would never want to meet alone on a dark street. I never stopped long, because I didn’t find what I was searching for.
Not that I knew what I was searching for. I figured I’d know as soon as I found it. It took me finally making my way into Montana to think…maybe. Maybe I finally found it. It wasn’t in the towns or cities. It was standing on a path looking up at mountains. It was the crisp, cool air in my face and the way the sun glittered on the water. I found something in the magenta wildflowers nestled in the grass, watching a butterfly chase one flower to the next.
I don’t know if it was the place or if it was an accumulation of two years of searching. Running. But each day I found something else, and it slowly, so slowly, filled the gaping hole until this pinnacle moment. In that beautiful place. Where I could look around and accept the feeling that bloomed just as beautifully in my chest. The word hit me like a freight train, making me stumble from the water.
That old, nagging voice whispered to me that it wasn’t possible. Not for me. Not ever. But that’s what I was searching for the whole time, isn’t it?
Peace.
I fell to my butt on that path, tears rolling down my face that I didn’t feel the need to hide or repress. Because it hit me then. That peace and grief can share the same space. It doesn’t need to be one or the other; I can have both.
I don’t think I would have come to that realization without the other thing that I learned. One of the most vital things.
I couldn’t run from grief. I couldn’t hide from it. It wasn’t a tangible thing that I could escape from when I thought it wasn’t looking. It was a part of me as sure as my bones and blood. My dad helped me convert a utility van after four weeks of rehab out of the hospital. And I left to do just that.
Run.
Hide.
I thought the tires on the road would lead me away from the ghosts in the rear-view mirror. That if I was anywhere else, I wouldn’t feel his loss like a limb missing from my body.
It took weeks. Months. To realize it didn’t matter where I was. If I was in my room or hundreds of miles away, the memories are with me, always. The feelings are there. His absence will always be this profound feeling that makes it hard to breathe.
But I also learned that if I look. If I allow myself to look…. I see himeverywhere.
In a pair of eyes that shine with humor. In a laugh that’s pitched in self-amusement and easy merriment. On a warm summer day that makes you forget what it was ever like to be cold. In the smell of fresh cut grass and chlorine. In a bag of Doritos or that first bite of a hotdog off a grill. He’s in all the things he loved. His smiling picture has been dangling from my keys for two years as I’ve driven around the country. Running.
Chasing.
I thought if I let myself feel the pain less, it would diminish how important he was to me.Is.If I allowed myself to feel anything other than soul-crushing pain, he would truly be gone. The hardest part to accept is that it doesn’t matter what I do; he’s gone either way. Just like no amount of comfort from anyone could pull me from my bed for months. No amount of grieving can bring him back to me. To us. So, I spent this time chasing him around the world. Finding new things that made my heart ache and grow when I recognized bits of that familiar soul scattered around the country.
Sitting on my butt on that path, amongst the most ethereal landscape…I felt like I was sitting in the heart of what his soul looked like. The breeze was his laugh, the sun his warm hugs, the mountains a testament to how he was larger than life.
And I felt peace.
Dear B,
I think I’m ready to go home.
I can’t believe I said that. Feels so weird to write. But, its the truth.
For the longest time, even thinking about home made my chest feel like it was caving in. Every memory there was a razor sharp blade just waiting to cut back into me. Every corner of that place felt haunted by you. Haunted by the version of me who lived a normal life… a life with you in it.
But now? Now it just feels heavy. Not unbearable. Not sharp. Just heavy. Like the weight of something I’ve carried too long and finally learned how to balance. Like that thing you’ve been putting off and putting off, but it comes to that inevitable moment where you know you can’t ignore it any more.
I don’t know what to expect. I don’t know what I’m going to feel walking into all the spaces I once refused to leave. I spent three years bleeding out in my room there. What started as a place of solace turned into a cage. A cage that kept me trapped with nothing but memories and every ugly, rotting feeling Ilet decay inside of me.
I’m not the same person I was then.
But I am scared, B.
So, while I plan on going, I’m taking a small detour first.
The lake.
