Lost in the Darkness

 

(a post from four years ago)

 

            Robin Williams died on August 11, 2014 from suicide. It’s hard to believe that it’s been that long.

 

Williams was dealing with Lewy body dementia that progresses quickly and is marked by depression, anxiety, paranoia, and hallucinations. His death brought light to a difficult subject, and the discussions I heard afterward spoke of the mental illness aspect of suicide. Recent studies have taken the blame off those who kill themselves, and removed the guilt from family and friends who felt there was something more they could have done to save them.

 

Grief's Landscape

Grief’s landscape is as much a wilderness as the one in nature. To understand, we have to walk with them and listen.     - Mark Liebenow

The Woods at Dusk

 

In late December the woods are quiet at dusk. 

 

I stand in my backyard lost in the mystery of trees. Two squirrels chase each other through the snow and gathering shadows. I listen to trees creak in the breeze, and hear the soft click-click-click of empty sunflower shells landing on each other, dropped by wrens and finches at the feeder. The magenta of sunset flares across the sky then shifts to rose and deepens to the radiant night blue of the cosmos.