Dispatch #6

One Year On

Dad passed on New Year’s Eve, so the start of this year also marked the beginning of life without him. Since then, I’ve delivered his eulogy, and carried a small urn of his ashes from Georgia to New York. I’ve turned thirty. I’ve lost one of the dearest friends I’ve ever known, and remembered her too in a eulogy. I’ve seen my brother graduate from college, begin his first job, and travel abroad for the first time. I’ve taken myself to Greece, where I watched as the sun disappeared behind the blue-domed churches. I’ve made space for love amid all, and fallen in.

And in some manner, on every day this year, I’ve mourned who and what I’ve lost, and all they won’t see or share with me. I’ve spent my hours finding where memories belong, where love without an object can rest, where loss can settle. Most of the time, there’s a crevice somewhere, maybe one I’ve forgotten about, and I tuck this here, that there, and make a note of the spot for when I need to return. But sometimes it demands space right in front of me, filling the view straight to the horizon — like when I cried as the glowing globe descended in Santorini because the day’s end felt too much like life’s: just how it goes. The only suitable space was whence it came.