What’s it like to love someone who is dead?

If you read the above question and thought to yourself “I can’t relate to this, that’s weird” consider yourself lucky that you don’t understand. If you read the question and immediately thought of a loved one I’m so sorry you’re also a member of this club nobody wants to be a part of. 

Having love with no place for it to go sometimes looks a little like this.

I thought about you today. But then again I think about you all the time.

A commercial came on advertising Frozen III and it teleported me back in time for a moment. I was back in our childhood home watching us all curled up on that lumpy brown couch eating popcorn that had probably an entire stick of butter on it. I can almost smell that saltiness in the air now. Our childhood dog, Baby, is going from kid to kid licking off our fingers and begging for a couple of pieces. She always ended up sitting on your lap though because she knew you’d be the one to give her the most.

We’re sitting there waiting for the DVD you picked to play. Frozen…again. You LOVED that movie more than any person I’ve ever met. You loved it so much we buried you with it. I don’t know if they even have DVD players in heaven, but I’m hoping God can whip something up for you and Baby to watch together up there now. I’ll throw up a prayer for buttery popcorn to be included as well. Truthfully, I haven’t been able to watch it since you left us. Maybe I can drum up the courage and watch the new one when it comes out. I’ll let you know how it is on my drive to work one day when we “chat”. 

My brain quickly whips me from that memory to one of you wrapped in a huge blanket belting let it go at the top of your lungs while you waltz around the kitchen and our dog runs after you barking, trying to bite the dragging part of the blanket. You loved to sing, but man oh man you were always so off-key. Off key, but with so much confidence. Sometimes the memories seem so real still I’m convinced I’m actually there. I smile and stay here awhile before the barking becomes so loud and real I’m pulled back into the now and I see my own dog sitting at my feet looking up at me. Probably wondering where her mom has been for the last 10 minutes. I study her cute little face for a minute before thinking to myself, “She would absolutely love you”.

You see, when you lose someone you love you oftentimes get stuck in this torturous cycle of being pulled into memories of the past and then back to the present. All of the memories and moments I have with my brother are all the memories and time I’m ever going to get. The only place my brother still exists for me is in the past. Memories are the only place I can spend time with him now. Still, time passes by and life continues on without him. 

So here I stand clinging so deeply to the memories we have in hopes that they don’t escape me while simultaneously trying to live in the present, making new memories without him. 

Loving someone who is dead is a balancing act of holding space for them and re-visitiing the past while trying to live and remain present in the now. It’s been almost 8 years and I don’t really know if I’m ever really going to get this “balance” thing fully figured out. But then again, like all things related to grief, do we ever really “figure” anything out?