4018 Days

Some of you know that I’m a counter. I can do anything as long as I can count it down. Here are some things that I’ve counted: 184 school days. 23 more papers to write. 30 sessions of radiation treatment. 195 days until the cul-de-sac churro party. 9237 more steps to the pub where we’re staying. No matter how high the numbers are when I start, as long as I’m counting down, I’m good.

But grief doesn’t count down. The numbers only keep growing. So here we are on day 4,018. A day that’s easier in some ways than day 35 or day 137 or day 1,643. But also a number that is already too high and only going to increase.

Today I share words from Nelba Marquez Greene, who is on a grief count-up of her own and who, through the Ana Grace Project, has worked to transform some small portion of that terrible grief into help and care for thousands of children. She writes:

There are 145 days until the ten year mark of the sandy hook murders and therefore Ana’s execution. But do you know today is somebody’s first day without their loved one. Today is someone’s 30th year. Today is someone’s ….

And then we have the people comparing and contrasting and evaluating loss. Like grief actuaries. We need to unemploy the grief actuaries. Let grievers be.

Be on the team that supports grieving people. All of them. Be in relationship with grieving people. So we/ they can survive. We intend to live these days with joy. With love. With purpose. With intention.

Until we see you, again, caramel princess. We teach. We live. We breathe. We laugh. We work. We weep. We rejoice.

And every griever needs people supporting them along the way. No shame in that.

I was blessed to be reminded of these photos yesterday.

In loving memory of ALL gone too soon- and the ones left behind to mourn them.

💜 nmg

Nelba Marquez Greene, The Ana Grace Project

On day 9 I shared these words:

First assignment. There is someone in your life who you need to thank. Today, find that person and share your gratitude.

Second assignment. There is someone in your life who is new to the community, or is alone, or is in need of help. This week: reach out to that person.

Third assignment. There is a need in your community that you are uniquely suited to address. This month: do what you can to fill that need.

Yesterday, I was given the gift of this poem. Perhaps it will help you with your own third assignment as we move forward into day 4019.

The Clearing

Do not try to save
the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create
a clearing
in the dense forest of your life
and wait there
patiently,
until the song
that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself to this world
so worthy of rescue.

Martha Postlethwaite

Robert, Ana-Maria, Sam, and Veronica. We love you and we miss you. May our songs ring out in your memory.

Ten Years In

Ten years in and I’ve got nothing.

My brain didn’t recognize the date. Maybe that’s because I’ve been on grandmother duty this summer and babies don’t read calendars. Or I’ve got summer brain. Or pandemic brain. Or old brain. Anyway, I didn’t know the date and here we are on the tenth anniversary and my brain is not with this picture.

But my heart knew. Because I don’t usually start crying when I sing the Wheels on the Bus. And I’ve been driving to this AirBnB for months now but I got really lost yesterday. And also, this is how I put on my shoes this morning. Puts me right back in the days right after the accident when I kept putting my clothes on backwards or inside out.

One shoe is black with white polka dots, the other shoe is blue with white flowers.
At least the shoes felt the same on the inside

So now that my brain has caught up with my heart, I’ve got nothing. Ten years of missed birthdays, milestones, family. I’ve got nothing.

But that isn’t true. I have friends, and family, and a new grand baby, and work that I love, and community. And I’m so grateful for all of it. All of you.

So here’s to Robert, Ana Maria, Samantha, and Veronica, whose loss ten years on is still just as hard and sad and heartbreaking. And here’s to community and family and friends. And especially to Christine, who found exactly the poem I needed but couldn’t find on my own. Take care of each other. The world can be a hard and sad and scary place and we need each other more than I can say.

Blessing for the Brokenhearted

by jan richardson

There is no remedy for love but to love more.
     —Henry David Thoreau

Let us agree
for now
that we will not say
the breaking
makes us stronger
or that it is better
to have this pain
than to have done
without this love.

Let us promise
we will not
tell ourselves
time will heal
the wound,
when every day
our waking
opens it anew.

Perhaps for now
it can be enough
to simply marvel
at the mystery
of how a heart
so broken
can go on beating,
as if it were made
for precisely this—

as if it knows
the only cure for love
is more of it,

as if it sees
the heart's sole remedy
for breaking
is to love still,

as if it trusts
that its own
persistent pulse
is the rhythm
of a blessing
we cannot
begin to fathom
but will save us
nonetheless.

From The Cure for Sorrow: A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief (c) Jan Richardson (Wanton Gospeller Press, 2016). janrichardson.com

Nine Years Later

For Grief

John O’Donohue

When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence.
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.

Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.

There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.

Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.

It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.

Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And, when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time.

“For Grief” by John O’Donohue, from To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings (Doubleday, 2008).

Eight Years Later

In Blackwater Woods

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

“In Blackwater Woods” by Mary Oliver, from American Primitive. (c) Back Bay Books, 1983.

Robert Howard Next Step Award

by John Edson

Robert Howard Next Step Award

We’re quickly coming up on the 8th anniversary presentation of the Robert Howard Next Step Award at the Stanford BioDesign graduation, June 10 around 6 pm. I have done a lot of things in my career that I’m proud of, but nothing comes close to honoring your memory in this way. We have been able to continue and strengthen this particular flavor of contribution you made in the world–and in a small way, keep you near us. Thanks to Matt Durack, Raj Doshi, Paul Yock and the LUNAR/McKinsey team for dreaming up this living memorial and keeping it going.

Nothing can replace your presence, your energy, your laugh, your thoughtful analytical brain and your amazing ladies.