September, I Remember…
It’s a melancholy place I find myself in on this World Peace Day/World Gratitude Day.
I am staring down the barrel of an ending that is somewhat unexpected, if not exactly sudden, and I wonder how it is that I find myself once again colossally unprepared for the experience of grief.
Is there really any way to prepare ourselves for grief? It’s formally defined as “deep sorrow, especially that caused by someone’s death.” Contrast that with the definition of depression (“a common and serious medical illness that negatively affects how you feel, the way you think and how you act”) and sadness (“the condition or quality of being sad” — a laughably STUPID and LAZY definition, if there ever was one). Grief is caused by an ending, which is funny, I suppose, in that perhaps it means that depression and sadness could spring from nowhere and, theoretically, go on forever.
Whatever the duration, grief isn’t a medical illness or just being sad. It’s more bone-rattling than that, appropriate as the season turns this Saturday. It makes it hard to enjoy anything once you realize — really and truly assimilate — that everything ends.
There’s no point here. But it’s a good excuse to post the video above and contemplate endings.
