...long term storage...

2016 ended and 2017 began in the red.

Losses stacked one upon another.

Some expected (still mourned, but expected) after long illnesses. 

Another that came in gently, easing the burden when hope was gone.

One horrifyingly fast...here, then gone in the blink of an eye.

There are holes now...big gaping wounds amongst family and friends, that will never close.  Children half-orphaned, spouses widowed, friendships shattered. 

And all the baggage of words never spoken: goodbyes never shared, apologies never made or received, fractures never healed.

There are those who spout out the platitudes. 

"Never go to bed angry."

"Forgive and forget."

"Let it go-life is too short."

But what of the hurts that run deep?  The fractures so wide that they make strangers of family?  The friendships that decay?

What of the losses that happened before this one?

What of the distance that's become normal?

Because that's what it is. 

Normal.

Life goes on and distance becomes normal. 

And it's okay to hold on to those hurts and fractures and decay, because they've glued all the new pieces of you together.

Loss brings people together.  It also highlights the distance.  The reminder it shrieks of the brevity of life scares many into temporary change.  Wounds are sloppily patched in it's presence.  Empty words and promises flung about as though in defiance of death itself.  And guilt amassed, on others' behalf.

"Never go to bed angry."

"Forgive and forget."

"Let it go-life is too short."

There may have been a trigger.  There may have been a  disappointment, or an argument.  There may have been hurt feelings. 

But now there isn't...there aren't.

The disappointment has faded.  The argument has lost its steam.  The feelings don't exist.

There are just strangers, living lives apart with no real knowledge of one another though once upon a time they may have walked side by side.

And there are memories, certainly, packed away in long term storage, of those "days gone by" when those relationships looked so innocent and carefree. 

Memories, like photographs, commemorating this moment or that...a diary of who and how and where you were at one particular moment.  A history, gathered up of people and places and experiences.  All part of the rough and tumble refining of who you are now. 

But only a part.  And a small one at that.

The present and future stretch on limitless, while the past is defined and contained.  Those disappointments-arguments-feelings shrink in on themselves over time as the rest of your life grows out of and beyond them.  Those people who you once walked beside spin out in ever-widening circles as you do, separate pathways divergent from the one walked together.    Life fills up with new people and new paths.  And you become someone other...someone more...than you were when they knew you.  And the version you knew of them is stored away in memory. 

Perhaps the box holding that memory is made up of hurt or fracture or decay.  Perhaps you locked it up tight in a moment of anger or sorrow.  Perhaps you went out of your way to bury it as far back and deep in as possible. 

But what's nice to know is that someday when you decide to, you may just go through all those boxes and find one you'd forgotten about.  Dusty perhaps.  Dry rotted, more likely.  Inside a little glimpse at a past that can't hurt you anymore.  Moments sweet and sour, brief in their age now, that set you off on a different path. 

There's no need to hold on so tightly to hurt and pain and regret.  It will keep.  It will stay.  You can place it high up on the shelf or far back behind the rest.  You can put it all in long term storage.  Because you don't need it.  It's not functional, or useful.  It's just the chrysalis stage between an experience and a memory.

~Leanna