Grief Demands an Answer

"Grief demands an answer, but sometimes there isn't one." I was watching House of Cards when a character said those words. It was Friday night, February 14th. The new season of the show released that day, and I had decided to enjoy my VD--uh, Valentine's Day--by marathoning some of Frank Underwood's devious dealings with a French press of Dominican coffee, chocolate chip cookies, and a pint of Ben and Jerry's Half Baked. Living on the edge.

Grief demands an answer.

The words made me pause; they landed not too far from some truth in my life. Not because it was Valentine's Day, and there I was by myself. Ironically, despite the saturation of red-themed everything or the flood of romantic tributes on social media, I've felt no ill will toward the holiday at any point. It doesn't matter to me what the origin of the day is or how commercialized or overplayed it is--I like it. I like what it can mean and can be for people who make the most of the opportunities it presents to love each other.

Even if I have little to no role to play in it these days.

99% of the time, I walk around in a pretty good mood for your average guy. But there have been moments, flashes, in which my jaw tightens. I may have been in the middle of humming to some happy tune, or reading an article about people going to live on Mars, and suddenly, grief is there with me.

It wants to know why. Always why. Not how. I know how; I've studied it. I have a phd in how. Grief grips me, desperate and confused, and demands its answers.

Sometimes I entertain grief. I wonder aloud with it. I draft up long, complicated conspiracy theories, and everyone is a suspect. I concoct interpretations that would take Peter Jackson more than a trilogy to tell on film. I write epic tales that skip with a scarecrow, tin man, and lion down the road to a happy ending.

No matter how fanciful or rational an explanation I develop, no matter how scared I am or how hopeful I am of the real answer, I always sober up and face this reality:

Grief demands an answer, but sometimes there isn't one.

Or, at least, there's no way of knowing for sure.

How do you satisfy the burning queries of grief, then? How do you learn to walk after loss cripples you? How do you get back what was stolen from you? How do your eyes adjust to the light after you've been held captive in a dark cell for years?

For me, three things:

Time.

Forgiveness.

Trust.

Sometimes one feels more important than the other. Sometimes I hate one or all three. But I need them all. More importantly, there are no easy answers found there.

They may not be enough to keep grief at bay once and for all, but they are enough, for now.

The Places I Dwell

1. My bed, 5 a.m., blanket pulled up to my ears.The still, quiet darkness of pre-dawn. The sometimes sweet, sometimes bitter aftertaste of a dream interrupted. I want to think, to contemplate, to dream while my eyes are open, but I melt back into the arms of sleep until the snooze echoes my wake-up call.

2. My car, 7 a.m., barreling down Route 202. The orange and pink fingers of the sunrise tap my shoulder from behind. The cold of the steering wheel seeps through the fabric of my gloves. This is when I talk to God. This is where I exhale all my triumphs, defeats, fears, hopes, desires, and dreams and expose them to open air before I inhale them again, bury them deep in my chest.

3. My classroom, 7:30 a.m., my laptop warming up. The air is heavy, thick with responsibility and anticipation--the moment before the clouds open and release their charges. My mind flits from memories to worries to faces to words, fumbling to put one last piece of my life puzzle in place before I turn my energy toward each jumble of lanky arms and legs, goofy smiles and bed heads about to storm down the hallway.

 4. My car, 4 p.m., the sun baking me through the windows. I find an empty parking lot, pull the brake, and recline my seat. I set an alarm for twenty minutes from now, put on The Civil Wars, and close my eyes. A few of my puzzle pieces float in front of me, and suddenly, my eyes are open again--time to move on.

5. The graduate lounge, 5 p.m., at a round table in the middle of the lonely room. Old furnaces line two of the walls and smother the room with hot air--I crack open the bay windows. I have papers, folders, notebook, laptop, phone, drink spread out across the table in a drunken semi-circle. I slide between work and writing and puzzle pieces, work and writing and puzzle pieces, work and writing and puzzle pieces.

6. My friends' couch, 8 p.m. (or 11 p.m. or 3 a.m.), its cushions soft and accepting. The warmth of a French press brew leaks into my palms through the mug. There's always music playing, always talking and laughing, sometimes spontaneous singing. Here I can be extroverted Paul or introverted Paul--both are welcome. I can stand up and scream for no reason, I can lie on the floor and laugh, I can sink into the corner of the couch and be silent. We sit and talk. They take one of my puzzle pieces into their hands, pass it back and forth, turn it around, and help me find a spot for it.

7. My car, 12 a.m., the roads open and empty. I drive slower than I do during the day. I turn down streets I've never traveled before--I'll figure out how to get home eventually. I imagine what it would be like if the world outside my car traveled to next year, two years from now, ten. The numbers on the odometer reach on tiptoes for 100,000.

8. My bed, 2 a.m., the light goes out on my last book, my last email, my to-do list. Sometimes I need the mumbled chatter, the elevator music of some show I've seen a hundred times. Sometimes I need silence and only the short, shallow snores of my dog sleeping on his bed on the floor beside mine. My mind usually comes to rest on only one puzzle piece--it's all I have energy for. I want to flip it around and study it. I want to explore it--plunge through the door into Narnia and chase it for hours, for days. But the closing curtain is too heavy. My eyes close, the curtain falls, and all is dark.

On Her Shoulders

This post is borne out of a series of intentional conversations I've had with several friends of mine--my "second" moms, my sisters. I wanted to listen and to learn. This is my humble tribute to those stories and the struggles expressed in them. A sincere thank you to those who shared with me, and also to writers like Sarah Bessey, Rachel Held Evans, and Emily Maynard for not only informing some of the content of this post but inspiring me to open my eyes and ears to what my friends have gone through their entire lives.

Please feel free to nudge me where I've gone wrong or have misrepresented you, and definitely share and add your experiences and thoughts.

***

photo credit: tessa marie images

The guilt trips for wanting to pursue a career instead of staying at home with the kids.

The condescension for wanting to stay at home instead of doing something "that matters."

The surplus of "I love your outfit," and the deficiency of "I love your ideas."

The disarming of her credibility because she must be too emotional. She's a woman, after all.

The backhand of having the characteristics, qualities, and strengths of men built up and encouraged at the expense of her own characteristics, qualities, and strengths.

The ache from her lack of opportunities when the same ones are available to men with similar skill sets.

The label of controversial or divisive for speaking her mind.

The accusation of being controlling for having strong opinions.

The demonization for identifying herself as a feminist.

The catcalls of the men standing outside of the drug store.

The full-body scan by probing eyes that's felt even with her back turned. Especially with her back turned.

The burning brand of Jezebel, skank, slut, and whore when all he gets is "that's just boys being boys."

The iron chains of responsibility for a man's lust.

The blame for turning men into animals.

The shame of "She was asking for it."

The helplessness of being violated, invaded by some of the men she trusted most.

The lie that her lost virginity is a permanent stain, an irreversible corruption of her "purity," a damaged, ravaged flower beyond restoration while he "just made some mistakes."

The bruises of Bible verses used as bludgeons to make her feel less than.

The blood trickling down her face from too many people who haven't hesitated to cast the first stone.

The vice of catch-22's.

The drumming of double standards.

The shackles of archaic structures.

The anxiety, the disorders, the tears.

The dreams, the hopes, the joy.

The strength to keep smiling.

The grace to keep forgiving.

The perseverance to keep striving.

She has carried it all--in her bones. In her heart. On her lips. On her shoulders.

This Is Adventure

Adventure.

The mention of the word can conjure thoughts of scaling sheer cliffs, diving out of airplanes, biking between massive boulders in the desert, running after important stuff with the intensity of Tom Cruise, adrenaline coursing through the body, staring death in the face--and winning.

When I think of adventure, my heart beats a bit faster and my mouth stretches its corners into a smile. When you think of adventure, you might begin to have heart palpitations or feel the undesirable suffocation of anxiety.

Today, I want to deconstruct our notion of adventure--what it is and what it looks like to have it in our lives.

When I think about college and what I miss most about it, two big things come to mind: relationships and spontaneity. I miss how organically relationships formed and were maintained. It was so easy, especially when you go to a school with over 40,000 students on campus like I did, to meet people all the time, everywhere. And once I met them, spontaneity was always the name of the game. I could get together with them any time, all the time. Want to get lunch? I'm there. It's beautiful out today--want to skip class and play ultimate frisbee? I'm there. Want to drive to Walmart at 2 a.m., buy some Mentos and Diet Coke, and launch some rockets in the parking lot? I'm there.

Relationships, spontaneity, adventure--it was all so easy.

After college, our friends scatter to all different parts of the country (and we do, too). We get jobs that require us to be up early every day, and we can't skip out on them just because the weather is nice. The friends we do have nearby aren't down the hall or within a five-minute walk across campus--they live in Ardmore, we live in East Falls, and it's going to take at least twenty minutes to drive there and that's only if there isn't any traffic.

There's always traffic.

Adventure becomes a challenge. Eventually, it becomes nonexistent, replaced by our routines--work, gym, dinner, TV, bed time. Repeat.

For those of us crazy enough or "naive" enough to still cling to this archaic idea of adventure beyond the age of twenty-two, people sometimes think there's some magic elixir we take, like something out of a Harry Potter book, to give us the power to dare, to risk, to adventure. Or they think we suffer from mental illness.

It's a myth, a misconception, that living a life of adventure is all about random, magical bursts of passion and excitement. That you either "have it" or you don't.

The first thing I'll say is this: for me, a life of adventure boils down to planning and choice. I've found that if I really want something in my life, or if I really want my life to be a certain way, I can't count on it happening by accident. I need to make it happen.

If I opened up the calendar on my iPhone for you, you would see little dots on dozens of dates for the next three months--these dots represent trips I have planned to go camping, climbing, snowboarding, visit New York City, visit places I've never been before. I put them on my calendar in advance so I don't get sucked into all the routine or obligation of life. Those things--the meetings I don't want to go to, the people I don't really want to get together with, the chores and the errands and the to-do lists--will most certainly happen to me by accident. The life I really want? I plan it. So many of my adventures are less like mystical fits of spontaneity and a lot more like the schedule of appointments at a doctor's office.

That being said, there has to be room for spontaneity. My favorite quote about adventure comes from G.K. Chesterton:

An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.

Again, I can't overstate how much adventure is not magic; it's perspective shift. One of the ways I've been able to live out adventure is by allowing room in my life to be uncomfortable and having the willingness to lean into that.

Adventure looks a lot like inconvenience.

One of my favorite memories of the last year and a half was during Hurricane Sandy. At that time, one of my best friends, Will, was living with me. Sandy had just begun to bulldoze her way through the area. Will and I were looking out the window at the slanted rain, the flailing trees, and the streams of water running down the street. Someone had the thought--and I don't remember which of us it was--to go outside and see for ourselves how bad Sandy really was. Once the seed of the idea was planted, it grew like a Chia pet. We said yes, no hesitation.

We scrambled to change into shorts, grabbed our jackets, and hurled the door open to face the storm. There was a large hill near our apartment--we climbed it while the rain pelted us from every direction. Once we were on top of the hill, we felt like we were in one of those skydiving simulators, or a scene from a movie with gigantic fan. The wind was relentless, and I felt like had I worn a bigger jacket, I'd turn into a kite and fly away. I looked over at Will, and he had a big old smile on his face. We were soaked and cold, but we were happy. I think we may have even crowed.

That adventure didn't take more than ten minutes, but it's one of my favorites in recent memory. Not many people in my life would be willing to take on the inconvenience of running outside and getting body-slammed by cold rain and massive gusts of wind. Will was, and I'm grateful for that.

Adventure looks like inconvenience.

This past weekend was the perfect example of what adventure looks like to me. I had planned a trip to New York City to meet up with a couple of friends. These trips are the kind that show up in my calendar--I've made it a goal to visit NYC about once a month. Why? Because I love the city, it's close enough, and Megabus tickets are CHEAP. What excuse do I have not to? Before I caught the Megabus on Saturday morning, I parked my car in the Drexel area near 30th Street Station. This last snow storm has made parking in the city a bit of a challenge, and I found myself with my car stuck in ice (like a hundred other people did this weekend, too).

Fortunately, and I will fight anyone who says otherwise, I have the best friends in the world. I called my friend Dave and asked if he'd be willing to help me get my car unstuck when my bus came back from NYC at midnight. The man not only picked me up, helped me dig the car out, and pushed it while I tried to reverse it, he gave me his car to take home that night when we couldn't get out, got his wonderful wife Wendy to help, and helped me dig and push again the next day until we finally knockout-punched winter in the face and freed my car.

For all the crazy stuff I've done in my life--a long list that includes but is not limited to free climbing cliffs, jumping off cliffs, camping under the stars, exploring caves, jumping out of a plane, breaking into buildings, jumping out of moving vehicles, driving at night with no headlights, setting all manner of things on fire (some of these are sounding a lot more like stupidity)--I hope, more than anything, that I'm always willing to be inconvenienced like my friends Dave and Wendy for people in my life who need it.

That's adventure worth pursuing.

Friends, your adventures may not include climbing mountains or braving wilderness, and they don't have to. I don't know what your adventures may be, but I'm pretty sure opportunities present themselves more often than you'd think.

I can only speak for myself here, but I've found that the best way to live life is not to view it as a series of inconveniences that burden me but as a series of adventures I have the privilege to undertake.

All I have to do is be willing to say yes when they come knocking.

The Labels We Wear

Every day, I wear a plastic badge that hangs on a lanyard around my neck. It has a picture of me, and my name. It identifies me as an employee, labels me as a teacher who works in the building. It's not the only label I've worn. I've had to wear ones that read Guest, Event Staff, and Hi, my name is Paul. The most recent one that has hung from my neck is Divorced.

That label has led to a few more collecting around my neck--Damaged, Used, Limited, Insufficient. I'm not quite sure who's responsible for slipping them over my head--other people or me.

***

We all wear labels. (Engineer. Architect. Nurse. Doctor. Writer. Son. Daughter. Husband. Wife. Responsible. Goofy. Procrastinator. Victim. Screw-up. Confused. Lonely. Unloved.) Some of them we have, indeed, put on ourselves. Some of them we've allowed other people to place over our heads, ruffling our hair, making our collars lopsided. Some can weigh several pounds, pull our heads down, drum against our chests with heavy thuds when we try to move.

It's tough to sort out which ones actually describe us and which don't.

I hate that the word (divorce) is part of my past, part of my story now, but perhaps it's strangely fitting because long, long ago, I swore I wouldn't wear the label of Typical.

I decided as a kid that I would never work a typical desk job. That decision has stuck with me ever since. Not only have I refused to push papers or slave away at a computer all day, I'm realizing more and more that what I'm doing now is even too typical for me. Just a few weeks ago, I was talking to somebody who said to me, "There isn't a job or job title that fits guys like us. We're going to have to create a job that doesn't yet exist."

I don't relate with people who know that they'll retire from the same position and company in thirty years.

I don't see the point in waiting until I'm sixty to enjoy life and to travel. I don't see the need to stop working when I'm sixty, either.

I don't dream of a white picket fence and a two-car garage with a Mercedes in the driveway.

I'll drive two hours if it means half an hour of meaningful interaction with a friend.

I only go jogging if there's heavy rain or a thunderstorm.

I actually think that I can sustain a sense of adventure and child-like wonder no matter how old I get. I actually believe that people can grow more and more in love as time passes--and I believe that despite what the scoreboard says about my past.

I've come to accept that my story includes a few twists and turns, some detours from the well-traveled path.

I've decided to drop the dead weight of labels and identities that don't belong to me. Typical: I won't wear it. I won't wear Damaged. I won't wear Limited. I won't wear Insufficient. Not anymore.

***

I cut lanyard after lanyard from my neck and let them fall like dead tree limbs to the ground. I look at what's left. These are some of the ones I think I'll keep for now:

Dreamer. Adventurer. Friend. Survivor. Learning. Striving. Loved. Determined. Hopeful. 

They're much lighter to carry.

They look way better on me.