During the Covid lockdown, we all stayed home and watched television. What came along at just the right time was the series “The Chosen.” I watched the first season and was drawn into the space of seeing human flesh put on people found in Scripture. The actor who portrays Jesus, Jonathan Roumie, demonstrates an extraordinarily tender humanity, empathy, and compassion in his relationships with the disciples. In a recent episode in season 4, I heard Jesus say, “There is no should in grief,” I said to myself, “Absolutely true.”
Grief doesn’t come with instructions. Our culture wants to have steps and stages to follow with directions on what we should and shouldn’t do. Time constraints are added to offer a timetable of where we should be by a certain time. Like a cake or pie we put in the oven, grief doesn’t get done. Grief is our individual journey of navigating a life without the person we love. Grief is universal, yet unique.
A question that came up for me in the first year was, “Have you cleaned out your husband’s closet yet?” There was a certain expectation involving what to do with my husband’s things after a few months. I knew I needed to go through his closet, and I knew I didn’t want to do it alone.
I asked my son to help me. He opened the closet, and we began to take shirts and jackets off the hangers. One by one, I looked at each item and had a vivid memory of the last time I saw my husband wear it: a sweater he wore at Christmas, just a few weeks before he died. I touched it, smelled it, and held it against my chest for a minute. Then I folded it and put it in the bag to give way. We spent about 30 minutes going through things. I had done enough. In the process, I found a red, torn sweatshirt that I put on and wore around the house that day until I went to bed.
It was hard to go through his things, but I also experienced a deep connection to wearing his red sweatshirt. My mind filled with memories of him wearing the sweatshirt when we walked the dog, or he worked on the sprinklers or made coffee. A reel of experiences where he was alive in my mind, and it was good. It was a hard place in a good way.
The way you grieve will reflect the person you loved and lost. You will do it your way, in your time. May you know the tender words, “There is no should in grief,” in the hard and good places of grieving.
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