Everyone has experienced loss at one point in their life. Some people, if you’re really unlucky, have experienced more than once. Or the time you did experience it, it was someone so close to you that you never needed to go through it again. Whatever your situation of losing someone was, it is one of the hardest– if not, the hardest– things you will go through in life. Having someone stripped from the world before you is many words with unfair being one of the most accurate. There is nothing about a death that is fair. Maybe to the one who left because they get to live in a better place, but it leaves you with the cold feeling of constantly yearning for something you won’t get back– at least not in this life. I’ve heard that God tends to take the best ones because he needs more angels in heaven, but I can’t seem to agree because if anything, we need all the angles we can get on earth.
Death is not easy by any means, but it is so vital to our existence as humans living life. It is one of the most important things to experience in life– but this goes for all pain. Pain opens new doors through reevaluation and thought processes you never knew you could have, but at the end of the journey, it brings you somewhere new, so you can be someone new. Finding a new part of yourself and discovering change can be the most beautiful thing.
The aftermath of death is all you live in when you experience a loss. The world becomes only a world without that person or thing you lost and everywhere you look, there are holes in the picture created by their absence. Every time you see their parents or family, you have to quickly look away because their grief is so great, you can feel their pain just by seeing their eyes that will never rest peacefully again. You see the quick smile come to their face when they speak about their lost child or brother, and how it disappears once those memories can’t block out the tragedy after a quick second. Communities come together to mourn, and let me ask you: have you ever seen a community mourn? Hundreds of people crying and reminiscing over a lost life that they claim was more worthy than them to live. Everyone blames themselves. So much guilt, and for what? So much sorrow over what could have been done and what would’ve changed if only someone knew– but no one knew. No one knows when the dark blanket of death is about to cover yet another body. All you know is the time you have with them and how it wasn’t enough. And all you have now is the world you don’t want– the world without them. But you find things that remind you of them. Small things that make you happy, and you hold on to those things. You find a new meaning of life as you know how quickly it can be taken away and you live the best you can in hopes of making a difference. You tell people you love them more often in knowledge that you may not get to tell them tomorrow, but most importantly, you appreciate today a little more. You strive to find the good things in life so that when it does get taken away, you can leave with a lot.
