I don’t remember much about the few months after you died. Going through day to day motions was torturous and done in a complete fog that I can now attribute to shock; some days the haze was so thick I couldn’t navigate. So when my Maple girls planned a trip to Arizona in January, they understandably hesitated to extend the invite.
I had no idea if I was ready; ready to be away from my safe space (my parents’ home), ready to travel again, ready to take a risk. I mean, it really could have been a disaster. It would have been easy to say no, and no one would have given me any grief if I had.
But I said yes.
Surrounded by a support system of life-long friends I trusted implicitly, I managed to enjoy myself multiple times throughout the trip. We spent time at a spa, went hiking, explored the downtown area, and ogled the gigantic cacti that dominated the landscape (so many cuties!!). We shared stories. I cried a lot and I know I laughed some.
Don’t hug the cuties…
…best to just ogle.
I didn’t get on the plane believing that the fog would dissipate, which in retrospect was a good thing. Because it didn’t. Instead, bits and pieces of sunshine broke through the haze on occasion; often at the strangest times and for seemingly no apparent reason. It wasn’t much, but the warmth encouraged me to open my eyes and gently poke holes in that paper-bag.
Nothing momentous occurred in Arizona. There were no significant realizations of self, nor existential crisis. I just remember it was the first time I had moments, snippets of time really, where I felt more alive than not. When I got back, I tried as hard as I could to cradle those snippets, and in order to do that I realized I had to start saying yes a lot more. So, I did.
It started out simply. Yes to dinner with friends, to a local concert, to a birthday celebration. And from there it took on a life of its own. Yes to a new gym routine, to traveling to Europe for a month, to solo travel. Yes to sharing my stories, yes to Nymph. And now almost a year since you’ve been gone, yes to a new home, new opportunities, and continued forward momentum.
When I look back on it now it’s pretty clear that long weekend to Arizona was the catalyst that shaped my current mind-set. I didn’t wait for an arbitrary marker on a grief timeline, or for someone to drag me out of bed and force me out into the world. I simply said yes.
Do I have moments of yes regret? Sure do. Not in the context that I wish I had said no to things, but in that I wish I had said yes more often. Yes to more lazy mornings spent in bed. Yes to even more I love yous. Yes to more silliness and more sunshine and more snuggles. Yes to so much more, before the opportunity to say yes to so many things was taken away.
But living within that regret won’t do me any good. Instead I harness it and utilize it as just one more reason to keep saying yes.