Today marks two years since my Aunt Shell passed away. Two years since I got a phone call from my dad and knew what he was going to say before the words tumbled out of his mouth. Two years since I wept in a stairwell before driving to their house where I would weep even more.
After she died, I saw her everywhere - a woman with a similar haircut at church, someone her height in an aisle at Target, someone driving the same car as hers. I dreamed about her, my brain trying to process her loss when I wasn’t even conscious, and woke up in tears wondering if that would be the last time. Eventually - I’m not sure when - I stopped seeing her at every corner and dreaming about her. Honestly there’s some relief in it; it’s been months since I’ve felt that drop in my stomach after glancing at a blond woman across the room and realizing it isn’t her, can’t be her.
After she died our pastor told us that grief never ends, the waves just get less intense and farther apart. I wonder if this is what he meant.
So much has happened in these two years without her. I was pregnant and gave birth to Abigail, Emily and Aaron graduated high school, Ryan graduated law school and married Kim, there were birthdays and Christmases and Disney vacations. At every missed event her absence was felt, sharply, painfully. The pain of today is different though, almost a dull ache.
Two years ago, we felt the sting of death. And though we don’t grieve as those who have no hope, we do still grieve. Today is achy - and honestly every day is achy in its own way since losing her - and though I know Jesus has the final say and death will lose, today still hurts.
We’re a little more than halfway through the Advent season and ‘tis the season for us all to talk a lot about the already, but not yet Kingdom of God. Jesus has already died and rose from the dead defeating sin and death, but we are not yet in the new heaven and new earth where there is no death or sin or tears. The tension between these two truths, which are both truths to be sure, is weighty and awkward and hurts more than I think I can bear some days. That day two years ago felt an awful lot like just a “not yet” day, but the “already” was there too.
Today I will put on a shirt that used to be hers. I will be led in worship by sweet Emily at our church. And then I will eat way too much pasta at her favorite Italian place because the day would be just too sad without some good old fashioned carbs. This is the already, not yet. It is hard and sad and good and glorious all at the same time. Thanks be to God.
