Sometimes you do things in the name of grief, of necessity, of a gut-wrenching need. Like drive nearly six hours round trip, to have twenty minutes with your brother.
I don't think it simply chance that he quit his job 3000 miles away, to work temporarily in the mountains here. During the fall, a space in time I feel most fragile. We all do, our mother's children.
And today, I had that need, a force so strong, I hopped in the car and drove into the night. There he stood, on the side of the road in the middle of no where and it was the most welcome sight.
Puffy-eyed and utterly exhausted I was, but I squeezed him and we talked of his adventures and laughed, and for a bit I forgot about the breakdown today, and forgot about the loss, and about how three years later it hurts as much and not as much - different but the same.
It's a white hot poker, so fresh and painful, and yet life is so intrinsically different I sometimes wonder if she was real at all, our mom. Or if she was simply the best dream I've dreamt.
I digress.
The drive was worth it. And I count myself lucky to have had the chance to even make it. To see him, the boy she loved and prayed for so very much. The brother I adore.
Grief changes and it doesn't. It's alive and it's hidden. And if you're in the thick of it, a month out or three years or thirty - you aren't alone. Not a single bit.
Hang in there and hang on.