I miss ordinary grief.
My father died ten years ago, and lately, I grow nostalgic for the less complicated days when the only mourning I needed to contend with was his loss, when I could dwell solely on adjusting to the scalding pain of his absence.
It was difficult enough back then, marshalling all my energies to bear the weight of that single, catastrophic passing and how different everything now was. At least then I could focus and attempt to wrap my mind around the unthinkable attrition I was experiencing. As formidable a task as it was, it at least made sense to grieve such things.
This grieving?
This is something unnatural.
On many days, I find that my heart’s attentions are divided now that there is so much to mourn over. The act of simply waking up means witnessing a loud parade of grief-worthy things:
Another legislative assault.Another manufactured political crisis.Another piece of breaking bad news.Another human rights atrocity.Another fear-fueled, empty Evangelical crusade against already marginalized people.Another wave of trolls spewing toxic filth from behind anonymous handles.Another dangerous, infantile, all-caps Presidential social media tantrum littered with malice, lies, and spelling errors.
And with this legion of indecencies, further confirmation comes of how broken we are, the widening relational fault lines, the cavernous divides that have surfaced. We look around, and we realize the scale of our collective sickness.
The evidence arrives in the vile posts of strangers, incendiary break room comments at work, overheard cruelty in the checkout line, and increasingly violent family gathering diatribes. It comes as we see people we once felt an easy affinity with become people we now desire distance from.
These hourly notifications announce separation, estrangement, and disconnection between us and those we know and love and live alongside.
We look at our nation and our families and our neighborhoods, and it all brings with it grief: not figuratively or metaphorically grief either, but genuine emotional loss at what feels like a death. Each day here starts to feel like another 24-hour funeral.
Our bodies and brains aren’t built for this.
We shouldn’t be continually grieving this way, we shouldn’t be perpetually lamenting newly appearing fractures, and we shouldn’t need to constantly defend ourselves from the wounds inflicted by those entrusted with leading us.
It’s all such wasted energy.
We all need time to grieve the normal things: the infinite space created by the people we love who have left this life, the sadness of the world without them, the adjustments we’re trying to make.We need to grieve marriages that have dissolved and children we’ve lost and diagnoses we’ve been handed and parents we’re now missing.We need the space to dwell on these personal tragedies because they’re more than enough to level us on their own.
This life gives us enough to mourn over without any help. It’s a shame we have to divert so much energy to these other unnecessary deaths; to traitorous Presidents, sham leaders, and predatory preachers, and to the myopic sycophants inexplicably worshiping them.
One day, this will be over, and maybe then we can get back to mourning the regular collateral damage of living and losing; at least we can dream of that day.
But not today.
I don’t want to grieve the condition of my country, but I do.I don’t want to lament the families who’ve abandoned sense, but I am.I don’t want to mourn the boundless cruelty of those hungry for power, but I do.I don’t want to be sickened by the silence of my former church friends, but I am.I don’t want to sit vigil for a dying democracy, but it often feels like I am.
I want to grieve normal things again.
I think we all do.
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