Everything We Never Had

by Randy Ribay

It is beautiful. It is burdensome. It is the glue of community, the weight of obligation.

Enough to relax, enough to focus, enough to be more than a hive of anxiety worrying about a world on fire.

Chris didn’t know what to say to this. What child knows how to navigate the unmapped terrain of their parent’s grief?

“We shall never achieve harmony with the land, any more than we shall achieve absolute justice or liberty for people. In these higher aspirations, the important thing is not to achieve but to strive.”