We should be so lucky

It’s been 10 days since my last entry. A week since I received the news. I’m sitting here, in one of my favorite coffee shops to work from home from, and I can’t focus on work. I’m an advocate for journaling because I have always believed it helps us unravel our thoughts and wash our minds of our troubles, or at the very least put them somewhere external and offer temporary relief, however fleeting.

These last 10 days have been full of upheaval. I didn’t journal because I could barely wrap my mind around what I was experiencing. Now, though, my mind is too full. All these thoughts and emotions need somewhere to go. What better place than the page?

So, I’m here, at a coffee shop. My laptop is open, but my head is bent over my notebook at an uncomfortable angle as I transcribe the contents of my brain into it. I’m trying to keep my penmanship legible so I can transfer these words into Substack’s editor in case this is what finally breaks my enduring streak of writer’s block.

I tried to write an article about anxiety, on Election Day, but I couldn’t quite formulate my points well enough and it has remained in my drafts. I tried to write an article about the loss of my beloved aunt, Carolee, but it was too raw. Too fresh. I couldn’t begin to process the grief yet. That article is a work in progress still, but I have a vision for it. It’s forthcoming, and it will honor her incredible legacy.

Here’s the thing, though. The first article, about anxiety, sat untouched because it felt foolish in the wake of everything else. It felt entirely unimportant. Full of petty worries and normal woes. I could never have predicted what would happen to Carolee, but once I knew, as grief was beating against me relentlessly, a new perspective was suddenly visible through the rubble.

Friendships end. Would-be relationships end. Male coworkers harass you, people let you down, you let yourself and others down. Life is hard. Life is long… until it isn’t. We should all be so lucky to go through those things, as hard as they may be. We should all be so lucky to feel our stomachs cramp in the physical manifestation of emotional turmoil. Maybe it sounds masochistic, but really, it isn’t. It just means we’re alive, and we should be so lucky to be so. So fucking lucky, because some of us are taken away too soon.

My heart is heavy, and will continue to be, but there’s still light, too. Carolee would want us all, whether she knew you or not, to open our arms and embrace it, because that was the kind of person she was.