today is the day to write the post

 so, here is the book of grief. 

I do not want to get into how many pages actually exist in this book. it is written, daily, by all of us, whose horrified eyes view the destruction, the death, the hatred, the anger, the killings, the....everything, all in the name of a god I do not recognize. 

It is natural for us to scream for justice, to wish the evil done upon the evildoers. 

I'm not joining the "forgive and forget" debate, ever. I do believe that forgiveness is divine, but so is refusing to allow the thing that needed forgiveness to continue. 

Today is not that message. 

Today, I have awakened to more bad news than yesterday. I am so weighed down by the shootings, the killings, the disappearances, the hatred in the streets. 

I believe that for myself, I must step away to mourn. And I do, so much. 

I told some friends yesterday that I was weighted the whole day. Today is Sunday, early, a time when I normally am waking to be grateful. Instead, the roar of grief and fury that reached my ears told me: "Today is the day to write the post." 

By "the post", I mean my yearly blogging about grief and sorrow at the holidays. It's bad enough we miss our loved ones, whether through death, division, lost contact, broken relationships. It is an insurmountable load to bear alone. 

Through all this, each year, I have posted a link to what I call   "my mourning song".

I have no counsel for this weight. It is too heavy for one to bear. But.....I'm here anyway, offering at least my companionship through these words. Hopefully someone can just take a moment to feel all that is natural through times like these: loss, and heavy weeping, and stunned silence, and numb shock. They're NORMAL, and they are not eliminated through our righteous anger. They're only held back a while. But when that happens, when the load breaks, when the dams burst, when the floods rush in.....what do we do then? 

Take a moment to be the best kind of selfish everyone. Take a moment to feel what you feel. Stand, trembling, to your feet when you are ready, and feel me next to you whispering "it's OK".