Memories in Moments — Grateful, yet Grieving
In looking back on the first year after my husband died, there’s a blur of experiences I don’t remember. I faintly recall cleaning out my husband’s closet with my son, packing some clothes, and taking them to Goodwill. However, there were clothes I kept and didn’t give away for whatever reason. As I looked back, I realized I wasn’t ready.
This summer, after volunteering at a homeless center, I decided to donate the rest of my husband’s clothes. Going through his closet, I slowly removed a navy blue suit jacket from the hanger to put in a bag. Then, I checked the pockets. In one pocket, I found three cough drops, and in the other pocket, I found 41 cents. I carefully took the cough drops and coins and held them in my hands. Holding them, I took in the aliveness of my husband, wearing the jacket and having his hands on the cough drops and coins. I sensed him living. Something so insignificant suddenly became very meaningful.
Out of this experience, I considered the way we are given seemingly simple gifts after our loved one is gone. In the mundane and ordinary, we discover something we didn’t know while they were alive. I recognized I never noticed that my husband kept cough drops with him. Finding them in his suit pocket gave me new information, and suddenly, they became important to me. I knew and loved the person they belonged to.
With grief as a backdrop, we see life differently. All of a sudden, we notice what we never noticed before. Like a microscope, something we can’t see with our eyes is now profound and enlarged. Memories aren’t just in the big events, celebrations, and experiences. Our memories are found in small, simple things that grow in size as we remember our loved one.
I think Dr. Seuss was right, "Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”
