Not All Of These Memories Are Great, But They're Mine

I thought about my life. About my life, the embarrassments, the little coincidences, the shadows of alarm clocks on bedside tables...
"You've lost everything" she said, as if we were sharing a secret, "I can see". If I'd been someone else in a different world, I'd've done something different. But I was myself and the world was the world, so I was silent.


Modern medicine will not do. It doesn't heal the way ink bleeding from a pen would. I've also been so distracted and disoriented that I've completely forgotten about "mind over matter". With this, and the fact that it took a whole month and three doctors to diagnose my respiratory infection... I could have been healed and healthy by now. But I smile wondering if it is some special form of empathy. I skipped Christmas dinner and spent it cuddling with my grandmother in her hospital bed, both of us coughing and having heart palpitations. Both for different reasons. She told me stories of the "old days" and the secret to a successful marriage. And her bread recipe.

This city is so full of reminders, memories that lurk and mug me. December 27, 2011 changed my life. I will work hard to remember exactly who I was on that day. How inspired I felt, and how I am closer than ever to KG. I admit I struggled. I couldn't ignore the one-less place setting this year. The bench at the end of the table we used to share. It was tight but I never needed space between us. The lack of words and photographs, in fear of bringing sadness to the room. We all felt it, tears on the verge of spilling down our faces while taking notice of the empty space. Our thoughts thinking themselves so loudly, yet none of us say a thing. 


When we were kids we had our own special place at the farm: the wishing rock. To us it was really a boulder. Maybe it wasn't that big, but everything seems so huge when you're so little. We climbed up on that rock and in our little sundresses, closed our little eyes, held our little hands together and wished with all our might. 

I'd take back all those wishes.

Merry Christmas Kylen Groeneveld. Two months without you. Here's to beauty and strength. Run the land, darling girl. Love you forever.

We laughed and laughed, together and separately, out loud and silently. We were determined to ignore whatever needed to be ignored. To build a new world from nothing if nothing in our world could be salvaged. It was one of the best days of my life. A day during which I lived my life and didn't think about my life at all.

The Only Remedy For Love Is To Love More

“So yes, I laughed. I laughed at the pain and the futility and the frustration and the heartache to keep it separate from me. And while it may seem like insanity to you, it is the thing that prevents it, for me.”


I believe in following your heart no matter where it leads you. It knows what you don’t ever want to admit and there will be times that every fiber of your being will disagree.  Those fibers will be wrong and they will steal the perfect and untarnished beauty of making perfect choices that just might be perfect risks and catastrophic failures. That being comfortable in the skin you’ve worn since the first moment you shouted your life started is the only way to make it through all we’re supposed to make it through. That all we really are is what we imagine we are, be it brave be it bold be it covered in the ash of burned dreams or watered down and drowned with the waves of uncertainty and fear, we are what we imagine so we need to let those imaginations loose to create the very best version of ourselves.


I believe in long letters and handwritten notes no matter how sloppy the handwriting may be, how wrinkled the paper and how much ink ends up on the sides of your palm that rests atop it. Words are some of the most valuable currency and should be spent wisely and on what matters the most to our silly lives. The construction of a sentence can be done by anyone anywhere for any reason but the construction of an emotion with the very same consonants and vowels requires the blood of the writer, not the ink of the pen, to stain the pages in a way that will move the eyes that read it.


I believe in myself and that I hold the dust of stars in the veins that carry the blood that carries the strength to pull me out of bed each morning.  That I am capable of all things but most of all that I have an infinite capacity for love and for giving that love away freely, no matter how it is returned or how little I receive back. That I give to give and getting will always be a bonus, a lottery I never intended on winning.  That I am capable of enduring such great pain but am also capable of embracing such haunting joy. I believe that I will never stop and never give up and never let go and never forget how to find the miracle in all this mundane and the eye of the storm and the silver in the lining and the half full in the cup no matter how shattered that cup might be, no matter how many pieces it rests as on the floor and how many cuts it caused on my hands that held it.

-tylerknott

Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines

“But listen to me. For one moment quit being sad. Hear blessings dropping their blossoms around you.”

Sometimes when I cannot sleep, I listen to Andy Garcia reading poetry by Pablo Neruda on repeat. I drift off to the dreamlodge and wake up hours later; Andy Garcia still reading. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

I ask myself daily, where do we go from here? Perhaps it's not wrong to have asked myself this daily even before the tragedy. Always wondering what the next step is. What's the next big move? If I am at A, where is B? And what is the exact distance? Andy Garcia still reciting Neruda's lines while I'm in a mid-sleep haze. How could one not have loved her great still eyes

Sometimes not being okay is okay. We set expectations and we break our own hearts. I am guilty of this. To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her. I am content. I dream and I fantasize and I pray. There are things I want, but not things that I need. I am content with waiting as long as completely necessary, I am content with working as hard as humanly possible

Kylen had given me a collection of Pablo Neruda's poems. One of my last gifts from her. A framed painting she made, Neruda's poems, and a book of short stories titled "No One Belongs Here More Than You". You can imagine the ache felt deep in my core when I found that book beside my bed the day after she left us. The words in the title were the words I repeated in my mind for days. What does it matter that my love could not keep her?

Life really blindsides you, doesn't it? With the intent to completely shatter and break you. To see if you have the strength to put yourself back together. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. What a cycle: on top of the world one day and not wanting to get out of bed the next.

Months ago I wrote a piece about the stories my body parts will tell long after I've expired. The scars and marks and transformations my body experienced over the years would lead one to predict the life I lived. Oh how little I knew about losing pieces of my heart. Not just observing the cracks in this thing between my lungs, but the pieces broken off and forever gone. Oh how little I knew.

I havent yet caught up with my life. It moves much faster than I do these days. My habits are starting to catch up with me though, as I found myself this morning in coughing fits, unable to get out of bed. Leaving raspy voicemail messages for the people I should have seen today.

There are many things to be grateful for. My colleagues who feel my forehead and endearingly tell me to get the hell out of the office when I do stroll into work because staying home is too boring. Friends that bring me soup. Friends that bring me frozen soup for when they're unavailable to bring more the next day. Waking up to messages expressing hope that I'm sleeping and not scared. 

My biggest challenge lately: Sleeping. Not being Scared.

Love is so short, forgetting is so long

We'll Always Have The Obvious

It reminds us who and where we are.
It lives like a heart shape, like a jar that we hand to others and ask:
Can you open this for me?
We always get the same answer: "not without breaking it"
More often than sometimes I say: "go for it"

It's When You Cry Just A Little, But You Laugh In The Middle That You've Made It.

One is never intrinsically strong, just by nature. You must have been through something. Strength has to be acquired. You don’t know how you acquire it. Suddenly you’re standing there and things that are deadly to others are no longer a danger to you.

Laughing with tears in my eyes. My key to the universe.

The Longing We Wrap Ourselves In

It's been a whole month, I can't even go minutes without thinking of you. I relive that day in my mind and it never gets easier. Absolute horror. The tearful message on the other end of the phone, immediate loss of breath, and indescribable pain in my heart. A million questions but all I could scream was one word. Where do we put the longing and how do we build a place inside ourselves strong enough to endure the ache? I love you more than you know, KG







How do we stop counting the days, when it’s the hours that
taunt us and the fact will always remain that it’s every single
minute that you are not near me that attach to me like thousands
of anchors and pull me deeper beneath the surface.  I am drowning
and choking and gasping for breath but it is not the water that
I am drowning in, there are no swallowed fish in these lungs and I cannot
taste the sea.  Drowning not in water but in the sheer volume
of tears that have gone unwiped by fingers taking leave of my
hand they were holding.  Choking not on a lack of air but on the lack
of you and the number of moments left unshared between us.  On the
life that flows beyond us endlessly while we sit on the shore
and wait to be ready to dip our toes in, ready to jump with
our clothes on.  


Is this what you wished for on all of the candles on all of the
birthday cakes from when you were tiny?  Did you watch the smoke
rise to the ceiling and believe with all your little heart that your
wish rose with it, disappearing into everywhere the instant it was
received by whomever would do the receiving.  I want to somehow
tell you that I can feel my childhood inside me, screaming and 
slapping the walls of my chest and when those tiny hands are covered
in the red of this aching and they match the color of those tiny knees
and the weight of it all crumples her tiny body to the floor of my 
insides what then do I say?  Do I apologize and re-light every candle
ever blown out in some weak and hollow attempt to repent for the
madness we will one day face, the longing we will wrap ourselves in?

My Thoughts Will Echo Your Name Until I See You Again

How will I walk steady if the ground should come alive?
And tell me how will I be ready for the world another time?


So am I another slave now to the screamin' in my head?
Or is it a little strange now how the moment's gone and fled?
Brother I gotta tell you that something here is wrong
Oh brother I gotta tell you... This place ain't what I thought

There is a funny thing about travel that inspires me to write. Did you know when you travel on bereavement this is stated somewhere on your plane ticket? I imagine it pops up on the computer screen like a notification. "This person is fragile, handle with care". They treat you differently. Not in a bad way. They just know what you're going through, and that if you start crying while eating their pretzels, they shouldn't take it personally. It's not you, WestJet, it's me.

The moment the plane touched down in Edmonton, it hit me like a bag of bricks. The closer we got to the ground, the harder it was to catch my breath.

I did everything I had to do. I did everything I could to try to find her, and at the same time, try to accept that I now live in a world where she doesn't. 


They told me it would hit me when I least expect it. I don't like this feeling. Waiting to break, so I can start to put the pieces back together. Knowing this despair is playing hide and seek on me, and will pop out from behind the wall it was sheltered by, startling me into a feeling I cannot even begin to imagine. 


On the car ride to the airport, on my way back to Toronto, the empty space in my chest became more apparent. I don't know how describe this. There's a new hole in my heart, yet, my chest feels tight. The turbulence during our descent into the city was no different than what I had been experiencing in my mind. Breathing recycled air, confined to a small space, surrounded by strangers who are no comfort to me. Shaking. Hoping I'll land okay.


I used to think that going to a new place was a wonderful way to escape whatever you needed to escape. Years ago I learned the hard way that this isn't so. You take your heart with you wherever you go-- whether it's whole or in pieces. Placing yourself in a new environment does not magically make you forget whatever you need to forget.


I am being very honest. I don't know if I know how to be anything else. I can be guarded. I can also spill my heart out to anyone that will listen. I go into hiding. I also make myself overly available to those who need me. I hurt, and all I can do is breathe through this pain and loss. Walk it off. I also love who I am and think this life is the most beautiful gift.


I am soaring above the clouds sitting in the window seat and I wonder if this makes me closer to her. I wonder if the warmth on my shoulder during the day and if the tingling running through my hair at night is her. I wonder if I will ever be able to see highways and forests the same way again.


There is knowledge in sadness and I am discovering more of it every day. I take comfort in the amazing people reaching out to me. I am alone with my thoughts at night and have yet to sleep without the lights on. I stare at the flowers that have been gifted to me and see it as another life lesson to appreciate the beauty in everything and everyone before it wilts away.

You Are A Child Of The Universe No Less Than The Trees And The Stars; You Have A Right To Be Here.

Today is my birthday. There's going to be one more ring on my trunk when they chop me down.

“And once the storm is over you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about."

The best gifts I received were the amazing words and letters from friends.

Happy birthday. I know you're in a rough time but I want to reflect on the positive. You inspire me. Your motivation and ability to produce in all areas you focus on is flabbergasting in its impressiveness. You're probably the most beautiful girl I've ever had the chance to actually know. Your wit is so sharp and I'm so glad I'm smart enough to pick up on the hilarious jokes you will drop. I envy your emotional strength. I rely on music to deal, but you know not only how to deal but how to help others. You're going to be an amazing mom, the kind I pray ill be able to have as the mother of my kids. I'm so glad we've had another year with you, and I so look forward to all the ways you'll surprise me in the years to come. XO, a kiss and a hug, and a happy birthday to someone extra special in my life. You're the best

Happy birthday Marley. I hope our paths cross again sometime soon. You're in my heart in this time. I think you have an incredible capacity to love and such a passion for life. Kylen couldn't have possibly known a better friend to grow up with. May this year carry you gently deeper into the beauty of what your soul is becoming. May you one day look behind you and see nothing but beauty. May the world feed honey to your heart and care for you in the ways you've cared for others. May it make you cups of tea, read you sad and beautiful stories that echo inside you, lift the covers of it's bed, invite you in and hold you when you need to fall apart


It's been a wild year, the last few weeks especially. I keep thinking of that quote: "If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans". We really have no idea what's ahead of us, but today has left me strangely inspired. ““Fate is like a strange, unpopular restaurant, filled with odd waiters who bring you things you never asked for and don’t always like.”

The Opposite Of Disappearing

This Nicole Krauss quote slapped me square in the face:

"He learned to live with the truth. Not to accept it, but to live with it. It was like living with an elephant. His room was tiny, and every morning he had to squeeze around the truth just to get to the bathroom. To reach the armoire to get a pair of underpants he had to crawl under the truth, praying it wouldn't choose that moment to sit on his face. At night, when he closed his eyes, he felt it looming above him"

Bright Side of A Bad Day

October 2011 was life-changing. Too much happened within that one month.
I just finished writing my speech for Kylen's funeral. I'm happy with it. I mean, I cry every time I read it... but I wrote what I needed to say and I'm honored to have the opportunity to share it


“Some days you must learn a great deal. But you should also have days when you allow what is already in you to swell up and touch everything. If you never let that happen, then you just accumulate facts, and they begin to rattle around inside of you.” -E.L Konigsburg

“I beg you…to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Do not search for the answers, which could not be given you now, Because you would not be able to live them. and the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.” - Rainer Maria Milke

"Some Days, I Have No Kind Words For The Universe."

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

My favorite childhood picture of me and Kylen

"I am heartbroken. May you find the peace under the earth that you couldn't find above it.
I loved you more deeply than our time together showed.
May you be held by the universe tonight." -TH

Rest in peace my beautiful Angel, I will never be able to understand or accept why you're not here with us
and why I cannot bring you back. My world is not a better place without you in it.

Torn, then gutted. Twice. And I managed to survive both times. Life is beautiful.

“In periods of rapid personal change, we pass through life as though we are spellcast. We speak in sentences that end before finishing. We sleep heavily because we need to ask so many questions as we dream alone. We bump into others and feel bashful at recognizing souls so similar to ourselves.”

- Douglas Coupland

When There Is Nothing Left To Burn You Must Set Yourself On Fire.

"I want to come from love. And I want to do it all the time. I can’t expect it to always look the same though. I remember a friend saying that God loved his daughter enough to say no – something he had a hard time with. Sometimes love says, “no this doesn’t work for me.” Sometimes love walks away, because staying would conflict with loving and being true to who we are. And, staying would make it very difficult to come from love”

Have You Ever Noticed Yourself Giving Your Best To The People Who Will Not Receive It?

And you love like your hand is on the horn, baby. I adore you but there's a hole in the cup that should hold your love

This was the world in which she grew and he aged. They made for themselves a sanctuary, a habitat completely unlike the rest of the world. No hateful words were ever spoken, and no hands raised. More than that, no angry words were ever spoken, and nothing was denied. But more than that, no unloving words were ever spoken, and everything was held up as another small piece of proof that it can be this way, it doesn’t have to be that way; if there is no love in the world, we will make a new world, and we will give it heavy walls, and we will furnish it with soft red interiors, from the inside out, and give it a knocker that resonates like a diamond falling to a jeweler’s felt so that we should never hear it. Love me, because love doesn’t exist, and I have tried everything that does.

Try to forget that I might be leaving tomorrow. Try to return the courage you had to borrow.
Nightingale, sing us a song to remind us we tried. It’s hard to reach out when both of your hands been tied