How Do I Let Go?

          Life works in many different ways. Often times, we will find that we will be very lonely and there isn’t anyone who may understand who we are. That path is often visited too often by me and I find that it gets exhausting. I am drained and my energy just goes out the door.

          When my parents passed away, I thought to myself, how will I ever move on? How will I ever have the courage to walk tall and smile? Laughter itself seemed like it was a stranger to me. I didn’t know how to function because the two people who always took care of me were gone. It left inside me a deep hole that I didn’t know how to fill. And the bigger question was what do I fill that hole with?

          I remember waking up after losing my mother and thinking, she will never be here when I visit again. I will never hear her voice. I will never get to hug her or touch her again. Life will never be the same. I was able to live a little knowing my father was alive. Then when he died, my world crashed. I felt as if my limbs had all been torn apart. I didn’t know who I was anymore. I had never felt more alone in my life.

          It took me so long and so hard to finally understand the term, “moving on.” How do you let go? How do you move on? In all honesty, you don’t; time moves and you find tomorrow is just here. You slowly and when I say slowly, I mean slowly, learn that time comes from a snail pace to piece your heart back together. There will never be a day where the pain will go away. You won’t find that life is better with a good cup of coffee or a good piece of pie. You just learn to lather life with sugar and put a bandage on it.

          How do you let go? Is it like in the movies where you slowly open your hands and let go? No. You wake up and you put on your jeans, make your coffee, go to work, and pay your bills. That’s how you let go. In reality, there isn’t anything more true than that. In between the hours of work and life, you balance friends who make you laugh and a warm hug that reminds you to smile.

          How do you move on? You take the difference of today and hope that tomorrow you will do better. You weigh the outcome and hope tomorrow’s will be better and that yesterday was a lesson you learned. You don’t run another red light because you were ticketed yesterday. You finish the day off with a hot shower and curl up in the arms of your partner.

          How do you live? By cherishing the memories you have created when life still filled that person you lost. You value keepsakes given to you and open your heart to love, live and laugh for all the moments they could not. You cry for the moments they will never get to cry for. You do everything they never got to do.