Dealing with loss

December 29, 2011
Sunflower Sadness 4 Mother by Michael G. Moore

I closed the box and put it in a closet.
There is no real way to deal with
everything we lose.
-Joan Didion

Well, so, this is the thing: when we suffer a loss, it’s not unusual to obsess about it. We massage it. We work it like a tongue fidgeting at a chipped tooth. We carry it like a brick in our pocket, always present, weighing us down.

We do this for as long as we have to. As long as it takes.

Maybe until, as Didion says, we realize there is no real way to deal with everything we lose. And then, like faded photographs and old mementos, we put our loss in a box and place it in a closet.

We can take it out any time we like. Even run our fingers over it.

But deal with it?

Maybe that’s just asking too much.

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