It doesn’t surprise me that your nephews have been on your mind lately. Too much lost, too soon. With summer coming on, all the more so that your memories would be raw. Sending more love……
There is something almost comically cruel about being the kind of person who holds it together during actual crises but completely falls apart at a school play.
And yet, I understand it completely.
In a crisis, your body knows what to do. Survive. Handle it. Don’t make a sound. The nervous system is very good at emergencies. It is not good, however, at watching a seventeen-year-old trip over his own gown while his mother claps like she’s witnessed a miracle. Because she has. She just doesn’t have language for it yet.
I graduated high school in Bolivia.
Not because I wanted to. Because my parents decided, in the way parents sometimes decide things, that we were leaving. We were always leaving. And so I stood in a gymnasium in La Paz in a cap and gown, surrounded by people I had known for eleven months, holding a diploma from a life I had not chosen, while my actual life continued without me somewhere in Massachusetts.
The band I had built. The girlfriend. The friends. The small, specific, irreplaceable empire of being known.
All of it still running. Just without me in it.
Most people graduate and step forward. I graduated mid-fall.
Here is what nobody tells you about that kind of loss. The cruelest part is not the leaving. It is that the adults around you are absolutely certain that what you had wasn’t real yet. The girlfriend wasn’t serious. The band was a phase. The friends would be replaced by better friends in better places. What they are really saying, underneath all of it, is: your empire doesn’t count because we didn’t build it with you.
But you knew what you had. That’s the part that never leaves. You weren’t naive. You were right. And it was gone anyway.
So when I read about a mother crying before the ceremony even begins, watching her son walk toward a stage she always assumed he would reach, I feel the pride she describes. I feel the grief for the nephew who sang badly and joyfully and with his entire heart, and never got to become embarrassingly enthusiastic about something small and ordinary and his.
But I feel something else too. Something without a clean name.
I feel the Bolivia gymnasium.
Grief teaches you something youth cannot. It teaches you that adulthood is not a destination you are owed. It is an accumulation. Thousands of small days stacked one on top of the other, until somehow you are a person who fills out tax forms and has strong opinions about coffee and calls your mother back. Eventually.
The nephew never got to accumulate. He stopped at thirteen, still in the in-between, still becoming.
Some of us accumulated. We just did it in the wrong country, in the wrong gymnasium, holding the wrong diploma, while the right life went on somewhere else without us.
A graduation is evidence. It is the visible shape of a future that actually arrived.
When you have lost something young, whether a person or a version of yourself, that evidence stops being routine. It becomes almost unbearable to witness.
God, this is so well said, and also opens up something important. Grief can be over many different things, not just people, but versions of our self that we never got to be. It's beautiful and heartbreaking, and we're lucky to be here. I, for one, am glad you are still here.
I love so much about this reflection. Period. The unexplained tears that many of us share in public moments like this. And then the private grieves of devastating traumas and some of us are carrying. The empty seat reframing Elijah. In Latin America and moments like this, there’s sometimes a rollcall as those who are not there in physical form, the leader says the person‘s name and I was convicted respond with the word “presente” meaning that that last one is present in the Thought thoughts minds and hearts as I was gathered. Thank you once again for a beautiful reflection.
Right along with my circadian rhythms, digestive and reproductive systems, increasing tachycardia, connective tissue degradation, public credibility, social viability, ability to contract for services, walk away from my van or reach out to my world in any way but this... All very compromised by the targeters' war of gradual attrition.
I flashed on all this when I read the title to your post today, "The Future We Are Given." I tell myself that the obstacle is not in the path ~ it is the path.
Oh wow. This all sounds so hard, and yet here you are, obviously engaged in the world. And what an incredible framework, the obstacle is indeed the path.
Another incredibly beautiful and deeply touching essay. One thing I've realized about you since I got here is at least once a week, I can count on you to write something that is going to make me tear up, if not outright cry. Like this one. You may not be outwardly sentimental, but you sure are in your writing. And I love it.
It's a wonderful you keep reading! But I'm so glad you do because what I've come to realize is that I get to count on having really lovely conversations with you, and I'm grateful for it.
So much love, hope, optimism, and thoughts of what could have been - and should have been, all squished together make for an emotional experience.
It sounds like your son is a kind, thoughtful, intelligent, and sincere soul who will do amazing things in his life. You and your husband must be so very proud of the young man that he is becoming. I'd say his future looks bright and is full of promise.
What an emotional rollercoaster it is to be a parent. Sending you love and hugs.
I think you named it perfectly, what an emotional ride it is to be a parent! Graduation night just happened to be every single one of those emotions at once!
I cried with you. We take the future for granted till it isn't And as a mother every step our children take into their future is a step away from us. Our heart fills with joy for the person that they are becoming but we ache for the leavings we know are natural and right. We have invest our love in to them knowing that slowly we will me to the exge of their lives as they fly
I am also someone who tears up by witnessing others vulnerabilities, joys or accomplishments. Empaths can't help who we are. Congratulations to your middle son for being a good human 🎉
Another thing we share in common: crying in public at events where beautiful stuff happens. Listening to music in public always causes me to burst into tears. I am 100% reliable this way.
Congrats on Middle Guy making it through high school; he sounds like a cool dude making his way in the world.
This just made me tear up...i am so sorry that you lost your nephews so young and in such a horrific way. I felt every word of this and it is so true but we seem to fail to acknowledge these things if we have never experienced them! Every milestone my children manage to accomoplish i tear up with pride because i know what it has taken to get them there and how lucky they are to be there!!!
Thank you for sharing such a thought provoking and emotional piece, it was beautiful to read. Also, congratulations too your son. He sounds like a remarkable young man who is going to acheive big things in life, i am sure you are very proud 🤍
When my daughter was 3 she was diagnosed with cancer and we began a 2.5 year journey through surgery, scans and chemotherapy. There were several times where we came very close to loosing her, but thankfully we all came through that, scarred in many ways, but alive.
A number of our friends that we made on the same journey didn't make it. Children's funerals are tragic, heartbreaking and devastating. I remember every single one of those kids, and sometimes wonder what they would have become if they had had the chance.
A reminder of how short and precious life is. I think it gives you good perspective on what is truly important in your life.
I can't imagine what you went through. There isn't anything more scary and perspective than what you just described. I've come to think of grief as my best unwanted teacher.
Somehow, though I have not experienced quite the same losses you have, all you have said resonates solidly. I have graduated 4 of my 5 children. I have sobbed each time. For things lost and found. For the lives they have lived through--struggled through-- for the lives I hope they will have the privilege of living, however hard that might be. I make assumptions, but have experienced the tragic loss of people much too young to not be walking beside me in my adult life-- and that forever shapes my perception.
Thank you for being here and for sharing your experience. These transitions are forever changed by losses. I would give every loss back if I could, but I am grateful for the perspective they've given me.
It doesn’t surprise me that your nephews have been on your mind lately. Too much lost, too soon. With summer coming on, all the more so that your memories would be raw. Sending more love……
I will take all of the love I can get. Thank you friend.
Anytime.
❤️
Now I’m gonna cry 💔
Thank you for being here with me, it means a tremendous amount actually.
So hard. And ~ thank you for seeing me. 🙋♀️
Thank you for sharing yourself here❤️
🙏
There is something almost comically cruel about being the kind of person who holds it together during actual crises but completely falls apart at a school play.
And yet, I understand it completely.
In a crisis, your body knows what to do. Survive. Handle it. Don’t make a sound. The nervous system is very good at emergencies. It is not good, however, at watching a seventeen-year-old trip over his own gown while his mother claps like she’s witnessed a miracle. Because she has. She just doesn’t have language for it yet.
I graduated high school in Bolivia.
Not because I wanted to. Because my parents decided, in the way parents sometimes decide things, that we were leaving. We were always leaving. And so I stood in a gymnasium in La Paz in a cap and gown, surrounded by people I had known for eleven months, holding a diploma from a life I had not chosen, while my actual life continued without me somewhere in Massachusetts.
The band I had built. The girlfriend. The friends. The small, specific, irreplaceable empire of being known.
All of it still running. Just without me in it.
Most people graduate and step forward. I graduated mid-fall.
Here is what nobody tells you about that kind of loss. The cruelest part is not the leaving. It is that the adults around you are absolutely certain that what you had wasn’t real yet. The girlfriend wasn’t serious. The band was a phase. The friends would be replaced by better friends in better places. What they are really saying, underneath all of it, is: your empire doesn’t count because we didn’t build it with you.
But you knew what you had. That’s the part that never leaves. You weren’t naive. You were right. And it was gone anyway.
So when I read about a mother crying before the ceremony even begins, watching her son walk toward a stage she always assumed he would reach, I feel the pride she describes. I feel the grief for the nephew who sang badly and joyfully and with his entire heart, and never got to become embarrassingly enthusiastic about something small and ordinary and his.
But I feel something else too. Something without a clean name.
I feel the Bolivia gymnasium.
Grief teaches you something youth cannot. It teaches you that adulthood is not a destination you are owed. It is an accumulation. Thousands of small days stacked one on top of the other, until somehow you are a person who fills out tax forms and has strong opinions about coffee and calls your mother back. Eventually.
The nephew never got to accumulate. He stopped at thirteen, still in the in-between, still becoming.
Some of us accumulated. We just did it in the wrong country, in the wrong gymnasium, holding the wrong diploma, while the right life went on somewhere else without us.
A graduation is evidence. It is the visible shape of a future that actually arrived.
When you have lost something young, whether a person or a version of yourself, that evidence stops being routine. It becomes almost unbearable to witness.
Not because it is sad.
Because it is so, so lucky.
God, this is so well said, and also opens up something important. Grief can be over many different things, not just people, but versions of our self that we never got to be. It's beautiful and heartbreaking, and we're lucky to be here. I, for one, am glad you are still here.
I love so much about this reflection. Period. The unexplained tears that many of us share in public moments like this. And then the private grieves of devastating traumas and some of us are carrying. The empty seat reframing Elijah. In Latin America and moments like this, there’s sometimes a rollcall as those who are not there in physical form, the leader says the person‘s name and I was convicted respond with the word “presente” meaning that that last one is present in the Thought thoughts minds and hearts as I was gathered. Thank you once again for a beautiful reflection.
Thank you for this lovely response Sky. I love the description of the Costa Rican tradition, beautiful way to hold space for the ones we lost.
As a professional solo flutist, it was very hard for me to play weddings ~ you can't do it while sniffling!
I cannot even imagine trying to do that! And what an amazing talent you must have, how cool.
Well, I'm no longer strong enough to play the flute. And every time I go back to singing I get dosed with phosgene until I quit. So, no music now.
I'm so sorry. What a huge loss.
Right along with my circadian rhythms, digestive and reproductive systems, increasing tachycardia, connective tissue degradation, public credibility, social viability, ability to contract for services, walk away from my van or reach out to my world in any way but this... All very compromised by the targeters' war of gradual attrition.
I flashed on all this when I read the title to your post today, "The Future We Are Given." I tell myself that the obstacle is not in the path ~ it is the path.
Oh wow. This all sounds so hard, and yet here you are, obviously engaged in the world. And what an incredible framework, the obstacle is indeed the path.
Another incredibly beautiful and deeply touching essay. One thing I've realized about you since I got here is at least once a week, I can count on you to write something that is going to make me tear up, if not outright cry. Like this one. You may not be outwardly sentimental, but you sure are in your writing. And I love it.
It's a wonderful you keep reading! But I'm so glad you do because what I've come to realize is that I get to count on having really lovely conversations with you, and I'm grateful for it.
Ohh, thank you for such kind words. As you said to me not too long ago, you're stuck with me now!
But let's be real about it, we are stuck with each other.
It sure seems that way. And I love it.
Me too:)
This was a beautiful read.
So much love, hope, optimism, and thoughts of what could have been - and should have been, all squished together make for an emotional experience.
It sounds like your son is a kind, thoughtful, intelligent, and sincere soul who will do amazing things in his life. You and your husband must be so very proud of the young man that he is becoming. I'd say his future looks bright and is full of promise.
What an emotional rollercoaster it is to be a parent. Sending you love and hugs.
I think you named it perfectly, what an emotional ride it is to be a parent! Graduation night just happened to be every single one of those emotions at once!
I cried with you. We take the future for granted till it isn't And as a mother every step our children take into their future is a step away from us. Our heart fills with joy for the person that they are becoming but we ache for the leavings we know are natural and right. We have invest our love in to them knowing that slowly we will me to the exge of their lives as they fly
This is so very true.
And I cried for your nephews and all the futures that will never be
❤️
I am also someone who tears up by witnessing others vulnerabilities, joys or accomplishments. Empaths can't help who we are. Congratulations to your middle son for being a good human 🎉
Thank you for this. And it's true, empaths got to empath!
Another thing we share in common: crying in public at events where beautiful stuff happens. Listening to music in public always causes me to burst into tears. I am 100% reliable this way.
Congrats on Middle Guy making it through high school; he sounds like a cool dude making his way in the world.
Ha, I love this connection. If we ever find ourselves at a public event together, I'll be sure to bring tissues!
And he is a very cool dude❤️
you must be one proud mama. I once cried at a wedding of strangers I attended from my hotel balcony. Just saying.
you must be one proud mama. I once cried at a wedding of strangers I attended from my hotel balcony. just saying.
I am a proud mama indeed. And also, I think you and I are clearly kindred spirits...
This just made me tear up...i am so sorry that you lost your nephews so young and in such a horrific way. I felt every word of this and it is so true but we seem to fail to acknowledge these things if we have never experienced them! Every milestone my children manage to accomoplish i tear up with pride because i know what it has taken to get them there and how lucky they are to be there!!!
Thank you for sharing such a thought provoking and emotional piece, it was beautiful to read. Also, congratulations too your son. He sounds like a remarkable young man who is going to acheive big things in life, i am sure you are very proud 🤍
This is a beautiful comment, thank you for this. I am super proud of my kiddo, and super grateful to watch him becoming...
When my daughter was 3 she was diagnosed with cancer and we began a 2.5 year journey through surgery, scans and chemotherapy. There were several times where we came very close to loosing her, but thankfully we all came through that, scarred in many ways, but alive.
A number of our friends that we made on the same journey didn't make it. Children's funerals are tragic, heartbreaking and devastating. I remember every single one of those kids, and sometimes wonder what they would have become if they had had the chance.
A reminder of how short and precious life is. I think it gives you good perspective on what is truly important in your life.
Congratulations to your son on his graduation.
I can't imagine what you went through. There isn't anything more scary and perspective than what you just described. I've come to think of grief as my best unwanted teacher.
Somehow, though I have not experienced quite the same losses you have, all you have said resonates solidly. I have graduated 4 of my 5 children. I have sobbed each time. For things lost and found. For the lives they have lived through--struggled through-- for the lives I hope they will have the privilege of living, however hard that might be. I make assumptions, but have experienced the tragic loss of people much too young to not be walking beside me in my adult life-- and that forever shapes my perception.
Thank you for being here and for sharing your experience. These transitions are forever changed by losses. I would give every loss back if I could, but I am grateful for the perspective they've given me.
Loss and grief mean we love hard-- really hard.
That is so very true.