Grief Is for People

by Sloane Crosley

And no one is obliged to learn something from loss. This is a horrible thing we do to the newly stricken, encouraging them to remember the good times while they’re still in the fetal position.

The past is quicksand and the future is unknowable, but in the present, you get to float. Nothing is missing, nothing is hypothetical.

Denial is humankind’s specialty, our handy aversion. We are so allergic to our own mortality; we’ll do anything to make it not so.

He is my favorite person, the one who somehow sees me both as I want to be seen and as I actually am, the one whose belief in me over the years has been the most earned (he is not my parent), the most pure (he is not my boyfriend), and the most forgiving (he is my friend).

our capacity to handle something shocking in the short term can make things indistinguishable in the long term. You become numb when you swallow too much sadness at once.

The miracle of life is not that we have it, it’s that most of us wake up every day and agree to fight for it, to hold it in our arms even when it squirms to get away.

I savor the dreams as much as I dread them. They are the only way I get to hear him say new things.

So often we don’t worry until there’s nothing left to worry about.