“What are you thankful for?”

It’s the inevitable Thanksgiving Dinner round-table topic, at what will be our first real ‘holiday’ since March. And it’s a scene I’ve played and replayed in my mind over past weeks, struggling to find the “thanks” that would capture the complexity of this day without it feeling forced. Contrived. Insincere.

Because when I look around the table this year, there will be an empty chair.

And when we take a family picture, she will no longer be there.

And as I’ve played and replayed this inevitable scene, I’ve considered my options:

Not attending dinner, to avoid the question altogether.
Attending and attempting to hide the mess of tears I would shed if asked.
And attending, but responding with a simple, broken: “nothing”.

And I’ve then pictured this word leaving my lips in remorse, expanding like a dark, gaseous ooze to fill every crack and crevice of the dining room, sucking the air of happiness out of guests’ lungs.

But as I’ve replayed, I’ve also begun to recognize why “thanks” is a challenging concept. For me, it implies a certain state of contentment or “okayness”—and right now, I’m not quite there. But despite this, there are aspects of what has transpired “After” our devastating March that are begging me to recognize my gratitude for.

So today, I will let my mind ignore the complex semantics of “thanks” to recognize these aspects:

I am thankful: that although a piece of our family is lost forever, the remaining pieces—my Mom, Dad, Brother, and Husband—have not scattered into oblivion. We have, and will continue to, exercise the strength, patience, and kindness that will allow us to hold each other tight until our storm clouds clear.

And I am thankful, despite it all:

That my dear little sister’s life existed.

That she gave us the privilege to be woven into the radiant fullness of her story.
That we each have our own sentences, pages, and chapters that are now painful to revisit, but that are ours, nonetheless. To cherish and to hold, even though she, herself, was not given the chance to grow old.

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Continue Reading My Collection of Grief Reflections:

1. Surviving The Loss of Sisterhood
2. (SOMETIMES) | Our Matching Tattoos
3. I Wear My Dead Sister’s Clothes
4. My Cherry Blossom
5. Dear Autumn
6. Behind The Scenes
7. What Are You Thankful For
8. Little Women
9. Our Last Day Together
10. Scrabble On The Psychiatric Ward
11. What’s Harder? Death Days Or Birth Days?
12. Rebuilding Trust With The World
13. Christmas Eve
14. Maddie, I Wish I Could Run Like You
15. All We Can Do Is Try
16. What To Say To Someone Who Is Grieving

Read my Sister’s observations, reflections, and poetry:

1. Two Belugas, Two Blue Guys
2. I am not a sculpture, I am a garden