The Ache

"He had discovered that grief did not dim with time; it was instead a volatile state of being."

~ Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The ache of a loss does not go away entirely. It merely diminishes, fades in and out of perceptibility. At times it is triggered by something; a memory, a scent, a song, a photograph. Then emotions and feelings and the gravitas of experiences rise to be known again bringing with them all you thought you had forgotten somewhere in the past. Sometimes, if you are stronger in a given moment you let the ache wash over you and move on with little damage to your soul. While at other times when you are weak, you let the ache weigh you down. In the weak hours you reach for a bottle or pills or a lover to distract and assuage the pain - to help you make it through the night. To know these things, to be these things, is to be human. And so it is human to live again, to dare again, to risk again, to love again.