The beginning of TIME

4.26

Dear Sienna, 

Time. 

They say that time heals all wounds. 

What they don’t tell you is that time only heals you if you let it. 

…

Sorry, it’s been a minute since I’ve last written to you. But also, not that sorry, because yo’ girl needed a couple of mental health weeks (months?) and let's be honest: life is too short not to take them, am I right?

It’s been a year and some change since you’ve died and I can confidently say that I’ve welcomed the inevitability of time wash over me with each new passing day. I am happy to report that I am no longer swimming against its invisible current; who knew that fighting something so inescapable could be so exhausting…I’ve fought the inevitability of time over the course of last year, seeking forgiveness in corners that no longer existed. In many ways I wished that time would just stand still, forever leaving a piece of me in hospital room 333… But life doesn’t work like that and neither does time. 

Tik, tok, tik, tok, tik, tok…

So how has time changed me? 

Better yet, how have I changed over time?

For starters, I don’t cry as much when I think about you. 

If I’m being honest, some days I don’t think about you at all.

Is that a bad thing to say? 

Time has a funny way of juggling around the things that hurt us. 

There was a time where I was convinced that I’d never leave that place, keeping our last moments together suspended in the air as I juggled what else comes with this grief; passing the balls between anger, hate, resentment and pain… The lesson only time can teach you is that I may not be able to control the sands of time from falling through the hourglass but what I can control is what I choose to keep in my orbit and how I choose to remember you. With each passing day I’ve chosen to switch out those invisible orbs with ones that bring me light: my friendships, my family, the twenty four amazing years I got to spend with you. I’ve taken this small hiatus of mine and filled it with laughter, joy and a lot of f*cking dancing. 

I know you were there dancing with me…did you have just as much fun as I did? 

Not wanting to break them wide open, I’ve taken the pain of our past and have gently laid it down inside of my heart; with it, the memory of letting you go.  These moments will forever be threaded in the parts of me that make me whole, but the pain attached to them is no longer something I want to keep orbiting around. 

Tik, tok, tik, tok, tik, tik, tik, that ticking sound played on a continuous loop as we counted down the minutes till you flatlined, haunting me till I accepted its natural fate of having to move forward. But sometimes, Sienna, forward motion looks like having to say goodbye; it also looks like forgiveness. With each passing tik of the clock I have forgiven you for leaving me, but more importantly, I have forgiven myself for the things I simply cannot control. 

I have found that with time comes acceptance. 

I have accepted this new fate without you, I have accepted the pain that comes with it, and now I choose to accept the happiness I find in the moments that come after. 

Forgive me, Sienna, I know that you have. 

Thank you for showing me that I can forgive myself. 

I love you. 

Love, 

Sissy