One Grief

I sometimes think there is only one grief. One loss. One death. We all partake of it, sometimes in a drowning flood, sometimes in a million little droplets. Myriad manifestations, yet one grief. A net sum.

Bill’s mother Diane passed on last Saturday, June 11, around 5:00 a.m. You know the ring of that phone call. It wasn’t unexpected. It’s not truly my story to tell, but yet it is.

Entreat me not to leave you or to return from following you; for where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.

I am here, and have made a life in Minnesota, after all. I changed my name with love and a vow.

When I grieve Diane’s life, her specific individual and remarkable contribution to me, to my family and the world, I’m also grieving at large. I’m grieving my own father. I’m grieving Hope and John, Gene and Ethel, my two cousins, my Aunt Kathy, Melva, Ginny, Sandi, Mary Lynn’s son, and even the Uvalde children. I’m grieving future losses I haven’t even experienced.

This is not to say of course that we do not grieve without hope, but to love is to eventually lose. That is just part of the equation. The more we love, the more we have to lose. Even with eternal hope for the future, there is still a hole left here and now, that all the wild turkeys in the world cannot completely fill.

Here is a link to Diane’s obituary written by Ann with my contribution. Diane Mary Kotrba's Obituary