Recovery

When you lose a child or a spouse, a parent or a loved one prematurely, feel free to cry out loud, to stomp and moan, to break some things, take long runs in the rain, sit looking out the window as if expecting their return But as soon as you are able, do the life-affirming thing: adopt a child, conceive a kid, marry once again, become a burning furnace in the community where you live Go to that mental hardware store and buy a big sledgehammer! Make everyone stand back! Break your sweet love out of that steel grief box and the burglar-proof locks that were its protection and its prison! Throw your love out on the ground! Roll in the resulting mess until you are covered by its smell! Warn everyone you know that you’ll run naked in the sun, dance to your own new music, let love and love-making become your signature activities, no matter what the neighbors might say! You’ll know you’re doing well when folks stop asking how you are and wonder how you got so crazy, so out of control, so unseemly, so alive! Emanuel Carter