(This isn’t a new story, just an old one I haven’t shared before.)

I lost a dear friend last week.

You know that rare kind of friendship, one of the few people you want to call when something happens? The person you can talk with for hours about everything and nothing, and you never really have to say “hello” or “goodbye”. Turns out “goodbye” came all too soon. Well signposted, yet still a total, utter, sucker punch of a shock. And of course, the person you most want to call, you can’t.

Grief rolls in like a wave. Like the biggest wall of water you can imagine. There’s a moment of struggle, and then you’re engulfed. There’s no one to fight it, and nothing to fight. You are the grief.

I sobbed. I sobbed until I could hardly breathe. There was no comfort to be had, and none sought. I screamed in anger. I blamed myself for not being enough. I cried some more. Until sleep muffled my tears.

Since then, twenty times a day my hand reaches to the phone, then, remembering, falters. I cry every chance I get.

In an odd way, it’s perfect. A friendship woven so tightly into the fabric of my life, its loss is bound to be felt. I have no defences. Nor are they needed. Love remains. Love remains untouched, though my heart breaks, over and over. Love knows the heartbreak. Knows the heartbreak as its own beloved Self.

And when I feel small, fragile and broken, Love holds me. When I rage at the unfairness, Love holds me.

With Love,
Sara