Don't Look Under the Bed

          Grief, it’s this many-pronged enigma that I and many other people have had trouble defining.  Over the years though you come to realize how hard it is to properly define a concept. Something as immaterial as a feeling is difficult to put into a box.

            Having things organized is this important concept for me; it’s how I get through my life every day. I schedule, I think things through, and I make lists. Normally to look at the state of my room you see a visual of what the inside of my head looks like. Laundry strewn everywhere, a massive candle collection, coupled with a vanity from hell is my everyday life. There are times when I obsessively clean everything; it’s normally when guests come over if I’m being honest with myself but, if you think about it this comparison is a literal personification of my headspace.

            I try to have everything organized, to put my feelings in this neat little box. A pristine cleverly decorated box and yet I’ve never been able to do it. I always package them up; I label them, and store them. Placing them under my bed so I don’t have to think about them on a regular basis. You feel like if you put in enough work everything should just stay exactly the same but, that’s not how life works is it? No matter how perfect your life seems to be reality tends to rear it’s ugly head every so often.

            It’s this idea that got me where I am in the first place. Post high school I thought I had it together. My best friend and I lived within 30 minutes of each other. I was graduating in one year and transferring to USF with her. I was interviewing for a job, finding my place in the new community I had moved to. I thought I knew where I was going. Then it all went to shit. My whole world collapsed around me, my expectations spontaneously combusted and with it my entire psyche disintegrated. I didn’t have any idea how to deal with it all. All of these instances occurred with one phone call.

            It took me along time to deal with it, to find myself again. This was due to lots of erroneous life instances but, the main one was I was alone. None of my friends had ever been through something like this before and none of us knew how to help each other to climb out of the hole we had been cast into. Rather than working together I think we all took it upon ourselves to claw our own way out. I’ve never asked for help from anyone but, for awhile I was bitter at a lot of people for not giving me the helping hand I thought I deserved. Eventually I came to realize my pride was what created that emotional road block not my friends. Almost four years later I see the problem was me.

I’ve overcome a lot of guilt in the past four years. I see the pain her family has been through, the pain they go through daily and my heart hurts for them. To be so close to a group that represents their daughter has to be the most excruciating thing they’ve ever experienced a part from the loss itself. Would it have been easier for them to cast us aside and forget? Maybe.

However they’ve chosen to do the exact opposite. They’ve embraced us with nothing short of the love a mother and father would give to their own child. They’ve dealt with their pain in the most admirable way because they’ve transformed something so beastly and all consuming into a pure representation of feeling. They love each one of us unconditionally; regardless of our mistakes or, imperfections.

It’s this time of year (the time of year Emaleigh loved the most) that I see how truly hard life has become for them. We go through the motions that seven years ago became a tradition. The cookie party, the gift exchange, the posse dinner and we remember what once was. This holiday is a representation of family and heartache because it highlights what is truly missing. The people who are no longer present and with that the Emaleigh sized hole in our heart begins to throb. It trembles and writhes in a mild form of agony; a discomfort that can’t actually be stopped.

It’s this time of year when I too remember. My “box,” the one I shove under my bed every couple of months has rematerialized. Because no matter how neatly you store it, it will never go away completely. Just as the events of the past can never be taken back; no matter what you do in the future that past will always be the past. However it is with purpose and being lead by the example of others that I’ve decided to store my “box,” in a different place; maybe not at the forefront of my life but rather in plain sight. It doesn’t have to be this main topic of conversation but, it also doesn’t have to be something I’m afraid to mention to people who don’t know my story. I see Robin and Neil and what they’ve done with their life post-tragedy and I’m completely in awe.  They’ve turned their daughter’s circumstances into something positive, into a proper representation of what grief should be. They make it look easy but, I know it’s been anything but that.

Strength is found in our reaction to the negative, to the tragic events of life. It is when we are at our lowest of lows that we see our true capabilities. I challenge everyone to take out their “box,” look at it’s contents, embrace the emotions that come with it. Fear only controls you if you let it and to overcome it one must face it with reckless abandon; completely head-on with a complete disregard for caution. I’m trying to do that; I’ll let you know how it goes.