Today is the first anniversary of your last breath here with us. The final milestone of the “year of firsts”. I burned a candle in the bedroom nearly every night for the first 300 days; but then it was time to stop that ritual. Today, I will light a candle once more in the pre-dawn darkness as I get ready for work, and then again, in the evening, for one more nighttime session.
The candle has been a significant part of my grief; and it is fitting to mark the end of this first year without you with its soft flickering glow and warmth piercing the cold darkness.
At first, the void of your absence engulfed me like the cold vacuum of space. The glow of the candle helped to create a pocket of light and air where I could breathe and begin to gather from the sensory deprivation of loss. The proximity of the flame provided a touch of warmth and a tiny beacon of light to see and follow like a lighthouse lamp on a rocky coast. Each night the candle burned, it seemed to spread its warmth and push the darkness a little further out like a tiny thermodynamic engine. This was reassuring to me; and eventually, I realized that there was sufficient warmth and light for me to live and breathe in this new atmosphere. So, I no longer needed the nightly candle.
Today, I light the candle once more as a memorial and a reminder of the gulf that has been crossed in the past 12 months. I can still see the rocky shoreline from whence I departed on that fateful last day with you. But the features of that distant shore are growing more fuzzy with each day. I know that I am still in deep waters; but, in the candlelight, I can see the faint signs of land on the other side. What awaits me there I do not know. But I do know that I will be forever changed by the crossing.
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