We Will Draw Strength From Our Memories

 

In the Tender Early Light

After people we love die, there are certain times of the day when we feel the absence of their presence most keenly. These are moments frozen in time, and even if they happened a decade ago, they can feel as if they happened yesterday. Maybe it’s 5 p.m., the time when they would start cooking dinner. Perhaps it was something we would do together on Sunday mornings, like walk to the bakery for bear claws. Maybe it was watching a favorite television show every Thursday night. 

What We Grieve

Our Astonishing Light

We do not grieve the memories of our spouses who died. Surprised? Me, too. Sometimes we are so overwhelmed with a profound loneliness that we grieve everything. Meanwhile the rest of the world goes on without noticing.

Proust and Grief's Memory

               Memory is a process, not a repository. Marcel Proust

The strength of memories is that they remind us who we were and how we made it to this point. As we work through our memories, we notice patterns of behavior. We also understand the murkiness of our past more clearly.

It’s helpful to sit with friends and retell the adventures of our lives, otherwise we forget the details, who else was there, and all the side stories. I also suspect that, over time, we tend to remember past events the way we want them to exist and not the way they were. People who were there can correct us. Idealized memories do not help us figure out the way ahead. Only the truth can do that.