This is a late entry. By design.

 

I wanted to soak in the entirety of this weekend.

 

For the first time since Linzi had passed…I’d met an entire group of people with whom I shared a very tragic truth: we had, all of us, lost our loves.

 

There I stood, talking grief, talking life. Not crying or feeling nostalgic. Not making attempts to console the awkwardness of those around me or having to assuage the numerous, automatic and uncertain responses of “I’m so sorry.”

 

It just felt…normal.  And normal is such a weird word if you think about it.  Some attribute it to meaning the average of whatever subject to which it refers, while others base it upon the opinion of the general population.  I like to think that the idea of normal is very relative to our own perception of what we believe that word to mean.

 

To me. This was it.

 

I couldn’t remember the last time I had been around people and not felt this uneasiness or curiosity in the back of my head, wondering about whether or not they were pitying me or asking themselves and maybe each other what it must be like or even wondering how I could be, or at least pretend to be, so happy.

 

I felt none of it. I was just with people. Having a good time. Thinking about nothing.

 

It was a moment of peace.  A much needed moment, as my life has ramped up tremendously over the course of the past few weeks.

 

The feeling of alone is a strange one.  I often think it will feel this way for a while…but weekends such as this one restore in me a bit of hope, and thus far, my journey of grief has been just that: building back up. Little by little.

 

It’s nice to feel normal again.  Even if it’s different this time.