Fleeting Moments

Reflections on grief, absence, and the evolution of the stories we tell ourselves

Hello again friends,

I hadn’t planned to take a hiatus from Substack in May, but as it turned out I needed one from public writing so that I could write for myself. This particular May marked 20 years since my husband passed after a year-long fight with leukemia. The weeks that lead up to the anniversary date are etched in my memory with vivid waypoints marking his decline and my reckoning with the reality of it.

I still remember making it through the one-year anniversary of his death. I relived every moment of every day, clinging to memories, rereading my journals, and endlessly thinking ‘this time last year’. And at one year and one day, I felt a confusing mashed-up sense of numbness at still being here without him and triumph at having survived.

Since then, I’ve learned that grief changes over time. Like a fog that lifts or a snow that melts under enough warm sun. It comes and goes; less like a deep winter freeze, grief pops up like goosebumps under a cool breeze.

Eventually though, the air reveals a simple reality: absence.

Like those first few minutes after sunset when the birdsong goes quiet. The black night of a new moon. Or how the hum of a song’s final note falls away into the dark.

Absence never fades. Absence lingers. Absence flares…

a purple dress shirt in a bottom drawer

taking the long way home to follow behind the scent of a cigar

a box of long-ago cards tucked in an antique maple chest

the ivory unity candle collecting dust

an unexpected photograph

the startle of a too-familiar laugh

how this season is showered with graduations and weddings and babies

one road forever washed out.

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For 14 years after he died, I was hell-bent on creating meaning from this experience — not just the experience of losing him, but of caring for him during that year of his treatments. I often told anyone who would listen that for that one year I felt a sense of meaning and purpose I had never before experienced. I knew why I was here…to take care of him.

It took a long time (and great therapy) for me to understand that in my quest to create meaning after he died, I was actually chasing that sense of purpose, much like an addict chases a high.

In 2018, I had to give a brief three-minute talk about a significant life experience to a leadership group. I stood in front of 60+ people and shared my story of our life together and my move to Nashville. Then I said something to the effect that “nothing would ever matter as much as that year mattered.”

It was a jarring realization. So much so that I sat down and had to steady myself at the table against the panic attack that made me want to bolt from the room.

That became my new story…nothing would ever matter as much.

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I didn’t understand how I had replaced my quest for meaning with a story of such despair and surrender until I burrowed into my treehouse this past month.

Alone, in a nest of my making among the wildflowers and the birds, I could feel less lonely than being among people, even the ones I love most. I could sift through journals and photos. Listen to new songs that captured 20+ years of feelings.

Mornings would turn to afternoons as I watched a Summer Tanager couple make their nest on a long branch parallel my front deck. Every time I stepped outside, they would alert each other and fly off to divert my attention from their nest. I took to quietly coming and going to replenish birdseed and water plants, reducing my front door use so as not to disturb them.

The Summer Tanagers are a striking pair, with coloring much like vintage plastic ketchup and mustard bottles you’d find at a burger joint. Males are red all over with slightly darker wings; females a muted yellow, my favorite color. While I’ve caught glimpses of them before in my woods, they have never nested this close to the house. In Native American traditions, Summer Tanagers are believed to symbolize courage, strength, and resilience. Their mythology and folklore suggest they represent determination and transformation, especially for women who have endured hardships. I don’t know who came up with that, but I tend to believe it’s true.

Through thunderstorms and gusty winds, the Tanager’s nest held strong. This week, a young male has fledged and is following its mother for feedings.

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On May 10th, I was compelled to leave my nest for a view of the night sky. I stood at the edge of a dark field, gazing at the pink and purple aurora borealis while surrounded by the hushed voices of other onlookers. A pink aura covered us like dust. The next night, even more people streamed into the park, quickly turning off headlights, quietly setting up chairs.

We all hoped the magic would reveal itself again.

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Fleeting moments of the past, like a singular solar storm shooting pillars of light, cannot rewind and replay. I wished in reverse, hoping for another night of pastel skies just like I have wished to relive once-upon-a-time moments. Just like I have longed for an entire life-path that never got to be.

As I write this, the barred owl calls out into the dark night.

Perhaps fleeting moments can also be harbingers like an ephemeral bloom waiting to be found and new stories ready to be made.

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Edited to add this link to a piece called “Drift” composed by Kenji Bunch and recorded by friends who created ALIAS Chamber Ensemble here in Nashville for their album “Boiling Point”.