Dear Rose
As I’ve grown older, and none the wiser, I have found that distance doesn’t make the heart forget and time doesn’t heal old wounds. These wounds scab over, leaving a scar that hurts from time to time. Time, as I am daily finding out, isn’t linear, even though the passage of it may be.
The years may pile up, getting further and further away from the time we were born. But the memories dear Rose, the memories that come with these years are certainly not stored in neat little linear boxes. In my memory, yesterday feels like a million years ago and 19 years ago feels like yesterday.
In my memory, you were just here yesterday and yet we buried you 19 years ago today.
I don’t think I was a person yet when you transitioned to heaven. I was too young. I was still trying to figure what life was and where I fit in. I was struggling with school and I didn’t quite understand why my heart beat fast when I saw that one boy. My personality was barely formed and then you left.
I was looking to you to help me figure this thing out. But suddenly, I had to find my footing in an uneven world that didn’t understand my grief. I had to stuff it down to be palatable to the world around me. I was desperate to get back to normal but anyone could see my normal had changed. Hindsight is twenty twenty and I see now that the depression started then.
The depression probably wouldn’t have been difficult to diagnose. I was sullen. I became even quieter, uninterested in participating in society. My grades suffered. I feared to laugh because I thought it was offensive to you. Smiling made me feel guilty. Happiness was a foreign concept for a long time.
I thought I wasn’t allowed to be happy because the person who had given me half her DNA had died. At the time, I didn’t want to live in a world where you weren’t. At the time, I felt like you were vital to my survival on earth. But I lived. I had to. You had left me with instructions that I had to follow to the letter.
The last time I saw you dear Rose, you said, “look after your sister.”
I tried. But she too, tired of the ghettoness of this world, joined you in 2019. The guilt of not being able to keep that promise nearly killed me. The two most powerful emotions were raging a war of dominance in me. Guilt and grief. Guilt and grief. Guilt and grief.
I want to thank you Mother, for giving me life. For giving me my sister and for giving me my Mummy. Thank you for living an intentional life and thank you for giving me a smidge of your sunshine that so many compliment me on.
I’m sorry you had to leave so soon. I’m sorry your life wasn’t happier. And I’m even sorrier that I couldn’t keep your promise. Kelly is with you and Paps and I know she is happier than she could ever be and resting away from the pain of earth. In her short life, she was happy. On that part, we tried.
May your soul keep resting in peace 🕊️