Little Nervous

Every single day since Chandler died, I have sat down at my laptop — at home, in Palm Springs, in Washington — wherever I am, to write my daily blog post. It is routine. It is healing. It is sometimes laborious, sometimes tear-provoking. I do it for me. I do it for Chandler. And I do it for the people who tell me it helps them.

Today as I finish my last-minute packing for a girl’s trip to NYC, I’m a little nervous. I’m not taking my laptop. One, I don’t want the complication of traveling with it. Two, there won’t be chunks of downtime when I can open up my laptop and spend time writing. It will be a jam-packed four days.

I contemplated writing ahead — you know, writing some extra blog posts that I could pre-set to publish each of the days I’m in NYC. Then I wouldn’t even need to think about posting during my trip. But after talking with friends and thinking through it, I came to realize that I need to post…every single day. Even if it’s just a picture and a few sentences.

I want this collection of blog posts to paint a picture of the continual day-to-day unfolding of this new normal, or whatever the heck it is. It’s not about writing the perfect essay or having a minimum word count. It’s not about checking an OCD box each day. At the end of this year, I want my daily sharing to reflect what was happening in me each day of 2019, the year my entire life flipped upside down.

Because it hasn’t just happened to me. It happens to all of us. Maybe it has recently happened to you, and you are missing your loved one like crazy. My hope is that I can be a trusted companion in your grief, and the best way I know how, is to just keep writing. To tell the truth. Every single day.

The next post I write will be from NYC.