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There Isn’t A Correct Way To Process Grief
Some people hold on and keep their memories close. Others let go, move forward, and find new meaning.
He was such a gentle giant. My grandfather held my hand as we stood on top of a hill that felt like the edge of the world. He assembled an old telescope, poured me a mug of hot chocolate, and stood next to me underneath the vast, twinkling sky.
“The stars are so far away,” my Grandfather said. “Their light takes years — sometimes centuries — to reach us. And each time we look up at the night sky, we’re gazing into the past.”
On clear nights, I can still see my grandfather putting his arm around my shoulder as we sip hot chocolate. He was present my whole life, and steady like the stars. But now he’s gone, I find myself sitting here, staring at the same night sky, wondering how everything in the universe can look so unchanged when my world has been utterly transformed.
It’s beautiful, but also heartbreaking. If an alien from a distant star system were to look at Earth right now, they would see this planet as it was decades ago. They’d see my grandfather and I going to church, driving through the British countryside, and staring right back at them through a telescope.
