As I mourned the loss of my Grandmother, I began to document the changes to her gravesite over time as I wrestled with the changes in my own heart, and began to see a corollary between the slow progression of the two. This photojournal is the culmination of the first year of my own personal grief journey. I want to be careful not to perpetuate the false idea that there is one “right” way to grieve. Grief has no timetable and it is not something that wraps up neatly after a set amount of time. It is a process and a journey, and it is different for everyone.

We buried you today. It’s unbelievable to say it out loud. You were so vital, so full of life and love; how can you be so still and silent? Now that it’s over and it’s time to leave the cemetery I feel like I can’t breathe. I didn’t expect this to be the hardest part. How am I supposed to leave you here, in this strange place, all alone? There is no more ceremony to distract me from the reality of what is happening. There is no “one last look” to look forward to that promises some magical closure I don’t feel I’ve received. The finality of it all presses on me until all the oxygen leaves my body and my vision blurs. I want to stay here. I want to curl up next to you. But they’re pulling me away.

I stop here on my way home from work some days. What a relief it can be after a long day of donning my cheerful professional smile and my falsely upbeat phone voice to come to the place where I don’t have to pretend. It was a shock the day the flowers were gone. I had been tempted to take a few and press them into a book but they were your flowers and I didn’t feel right taking them. The earth looks raw and bare without them, like a gaping wound. It feels unnatural; a blemish in the peaceful, perfect landscape, but oddly appropriate. Something is amiss; the world has changed. I lie down next to the earthen mound, feel the warm summer sun, and let myself cry a little until the pressure in my heart and head subside and I can continue home.

It’s been two weeks, and the rough mound of earth has been smoothed over. Watching the grave settle makes me uneasy as I feel the passage of time. I just saw you this month. I can count the time since I last held your hand in days. I am terrified to move forward. A part of me clings to the pain; guards and hordes it. If time passes and I begin to heal, will I forget the sound of your voice? The softness of your hair? If the pain drains away, will you feel less real? Will your very existence be a dream, disappeared with the morning light? If I don’t feel the ache of your absence, will it mean I don’t love you anymore? If I let you go, will you truly be gone?

It feels like there is an ocean of tears just below the surface of my skin, and the slightest pressure will cause a rip and let it come seeping out. I have been scourged with sandpaper and the first scabs are beginning to form, but they are tenuous and erratic, like the scant patches of grass over your grave that give way to gaping holes. I visit with no one. I take part in nothing. I work and I lie on the couch, trying to keep the world from touching me. I pray out loud and ask God how long this will last. I beg Him to bring me through this and, simultaneously, to stop time and let me exist in a solitary, in-between world. I tell Him I can’t bear the passage of time that pulls us further and further apart. And then, in a moment of clarity, I hear a voice in my head say, “Time is not pulling you away from her. Time is bringing you closer to the day you will be reunited.”

It’s New Year’s Eve. Once summer ended and the cold days set in, time seemed to pass in a whirlwind. While it was comforting to come here in the warmth, it makes me uncomfortable to think of you out here in the cold (even though logically I know this makes no sense) so I have stayed away. I rediscovered a note you wrote me when I was little that said, “You are an angel. Have happy days always!” I framed it and put it on my dresser; a way to keep you present each day. But now, on the last day of 2015, I come to reflect on how much has changed. I will enter a year you will never know. I wish that realization didn’t pick at my brain like an insect I can’t swish away. I ask God to tell you that I love you. After six months I have not forgotten your voice, and there is a comfort in that which seeps warmth into my scabbed heart.

What a winter we are having. It was 80 degrees on Christmas and then we had a record blizzard. I don’t worry that you are cold any longer. I like to think you can enjoy the beauty from where you are. On Sunday I attended church at the place I used to go with you when I was little. During one hymn I thought of you and started to cry when I heard a voice in my head say, “Why are you crying? You cry for yourself. Don’t you see that she is restored? She is well!” And I know that it is true. I can feel God working in my heart, bringing my grief into perspective. Little by little, the scabs are revealing new skin underneath – precarious, vulnerable, but healing all the same.

I came to celebrate Grandpop’s birthday. I know you always marked this day by having a mass said for him, so the least I could do is bring flowers. He died before I was two years old (on his birthday, no less) and sadly I have no memory of him, but I know he loved me and I love him still. He was the love of your life and made you so very happy and so I honor him for all the joy he brought to you. This is the first time I came to your grave and did not cry. My head and heart are still. Not simply numb – still. I know you would want this. I know you wouldn’t want to see me cry. Besides, today is a celebration of all the happiness you were blessed with. This isn’t a day for tears.

Today is your birthday. You would have been 87 years old. Last year on this day dad and I spent the afternoon at the nursing home with you, watching Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune and playing along while you watched and smiled. You didn’t eat much dinner but you certainly had room for the peanut butter eggs my uncle brought you for a present. Sometimes you had a little difficulty feeding yourself – or maybe you just didn’t have much interest in the food – but you had no trouble digging into that box for the chocolate. It’s funny the little moments that suddenly become precious. I miss you today. It used to make me sad that you couldn’t follow along with Jeopardy anymore like you used to when I was young but now I just want one more day sitting beside you doing anything at all.

It’s hard to forget where I was on this day last year. Sitting in the ICU next to dad, in gowns and gloves, listening to the doctor say there was nothing more to be done. They wanted to remove your ventilator and move you to hospice. They said you would not regain consciousness. Your body was simply failing and it was time to let go. You might even pass within minutes. We steeled ourselves, they removed the ventilator…and you opened your eyes and laughed in the nurse’s face. Laughed at her. God gave you back to us that day, for a little while longer. The doctors warned that we would be back here again soon, that your health would spiral down until you couldn’t bounce back again, but we would not lose you this day. The very next day you looked me in the eyes and said the words I hadn’t heard in years and thought I never would again: “I love you.” Clear as a bell and lucid. And I will carry that memory – that miracle – with me forever.

Being at this cemetery for the funeral of another family member, sitting through the service led by the same priest who conducted yours, my mind steps constantly backwards. Last year we were in the middle of the downward descent of your health – in the hospital one week, back to the nursing home the next, back to the hospital again, each time bracing for the worst and hoping for more time. Can it be nearly a year already? I feel strong but fragile as I reminisce. I have accepted the fact that I cannot change time and have ceased trying; however, like muscle memory, my mind pushes back against the coming anniversary I dread facing.

Last year, this was the last day I saw you well. You were in the hospital after your last episode but about to be released the next day. Mom and I visited you while dad was out of town. It was awkward, to be honest, because your dementia prevented you from conversing with us. We sat, uncertain, wanting to be there but not knowing how to pass the evening. This awkwardness was something I struggled with for years and relied on dad to alleviate. So, without him, I tried to channel his easy-going manner. I sat on your bedside, held your hand, and explained where dad was. I talked about the music selection the nurses picked and changed it to something you’d like better. I took a short video of you smiling and laughing, me cajoling you to blow kisses. I watch this video now on repeat. This was the day you taught me to step outside of myself; to pull from a strength within me beneath the uncertainty and discomfort; to exude calm in the face of anxiety; to not be afraid of the silence. Thank you.

This was the day you died. I tried to fight waking up in the middle of the night wondering, “Was this the moment God called you home? Was this the hour the world faded away?” I tried not to think about getting the call that morning or anything that happened after. I decided that’s not what today is about. Today is a celebration of the 86 years you spent on this earth, loving and being loved. I celebrate the fact I was blessed enough to be in your life. I celebrate the fact that your pain is over, your dementia is gone, and you are restored in our Lord and Savior. I play “How Great Thou Art” on my phone, singing along as I remember you singing that very hymn next to me. “I can’t carry a tune in a bucket,” you once told me, “but I love to sing and in church it doesn’t matter!” I read some bible verses aloud I think you would appreciate. “For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone.” I still cry because I miss your hugs and your advice; because I envy and lack your grace and kindness; because the world feels colder without your presence. But only for a bit, and then I quiet. You don’t feel so far away today. I know that I still love you, just as much as I did a year ago. It has not diminished or disappeared. I know that you still love me, just as much as you always did. Our tie is not severed simply because we are in different places. You are still my Grandmom. For the first time, this is something I know, rather than something I tell myself.

We buried you a year ago today. It’s unbelievable to say it out loud. It is a beautiful summer day, so different from the cold and rainy morning we said goodbye. Today there is no ceremony, only quiet time to reflect. I place my hands on the ground, imagining the layers of earth that physically separate us, but I feel you so much all around me that the physical proximity doesn’t affect me the way it once did – it neither comforts nor chills. I no longer wish to stop the world and lie down next to you in the grave. I feel the vital energy you left behind – the adventurous spirit of the woman who traveled the world and reveled in her career. I want to make you proud. I want to accomplish the things I told you I would while I have the gift of being here in this world. I want to embody your kindness and faith and fearlessness. I want to live in honor of you, but to do that, I need to live.

I stand back and look at the mark in the earth your burial made. The wound, which was once so ragged and raw it seemed impossible it would ever heal, has covered over with new growth. The scars are still visible, however, and rough around the edges in some places. Time has brought progress; not a completion to the journey, but miles along the route. It will never be the same, but I know the growth will continue.

I remember the words you wrote to me when I was a little girl. “You are an angel. Have happy days always!” So I will not weep today. I will smile, blow you a kiss, and go in search of my happiness.

Experience the world of 1908 and get a glimpse of Victorian death customs in my novel, The Persistence of Vision, available on Amazon in paperback and on Kindle.

Read more at LisaGery.com