Where Love Heals

I woke up with gratitude
sitting gently beside grief
like they’ve learned how to share a room
without speaking.

Today something wonderful happened.

The kind of thing that would have had me reaching for my phone before I had fully finished smiling.

And I did.

For one second, I forgot.

Forgot that we don’t talk anymore.

Forgot that you are no longer the person I tell first.

The realization arrived all at once.

Like missing a step in the dark.

Like waking from a dream and remembering where you are.

It stole my breath for a moment.

Not because I needed anything from you.

Not because I wanted to change what is.

Just because my first instinct was still to share it with you.

And grief, I am learning, sometimes sounds exactly like that.

I miss you—
not in a way that asks you to come back,
but in a quiet, aching way
that lives in the background of my days.

And still…

I got up.
I went to work.
I chose myself
in small, invisible ways.

Because I’m learning
that missing someone
is not the same as needing them

and love,
real love,

doesn’t ask me to stay in pain
just to keep pieces of you.

So today,
I will carry both,
the gratitude
and the heaviness

and I will still move forward,

softly…
but on purpose.

Jacque