Wedding Ashes — Today is my last day of the pandemic. So why am I still so scared?
(Free Version available on CGAPeterson.com)
It’s been fifteen days since my second dose. The world, for me, is safe again. So why do I still feel so scared?
I’m writing in a cafe. The visual vestiges of pandemic still in full force. Unusable chairs are zip-tied together at the legs. A mousepad sized sticker informs me loudly, “this table is unavailable.” I imagine a graphic designer spent at least an afternoon before he sent it off to corporate for approval. But no whimsical font can change the sadness of its message. The lament of Marius — empty chairs at empty tables. Plus, the color sucks. Like someone tried to turn down a lemon.
A well composed mid-30s corporate type juggles an iPad and a laptop. Her fingers keep covering the six tiny faces in her video call as she tries to keep it plugged in. She’s working remote, but still speaks corporate direct. I hear, “streamlining” and “chime if you don’t agree, Hillary.” I smirk waiting for, “let’s circle back” when I’m snapped away.
“We lost our daughter in a car accident.” The wedding planner on the right says to the couple.
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that. When was that?”
“2011,” she says, “That might seem like a long time, but when you lose someone that close to you… well… we still feel it.”
The formalities begin. Sorry for your loss. What happened? Was she married? The story unfolds. Formerly mom says her daughter was a hero. She was in the back seat. A passenger, but she wrapped herself around the person next to her just in time. She died a hero. But she still died. And her mother is still feeling it.
The soon-to-be husband at the table is clearly not listening. He mumbles some tone-deaf non-condolence, his phone rings, and he takes a flipping video call. My sympathy turns to anger. How can you hear this story and not have your heart broken? How can you just close yourself to this pain you’re right in front of?
But I notice I’m staring, probably with one of those “the fuck is wrong with you?” faces I never seem to notice I’m wearing till it’s too late. Plus, I’m eavesdropping. So, I look away. Eyes back to the zip ties around the chairs, the “don’t sit here” stickers on the tables. Oh yeah, pandemic.
I often described myself as not just single, but very single. Looking for someone and never finding them. This last year wounded so many lives. People were evicted. People died. But selfishly, New York closing and everyone moving in with their parents made dating pretty impossible. Social distancing, it turns out, is the ultimate cock block.
Part of me wants to mourn this somehow. Pour one out for the hundreds of thousands of first dates the world missed. But how do you grieve the loss of something you never had?
You can’t bury a graduation walk that never was. You can’t scatter the ashes of a wedding delay. These rituals are the punctuation marks of our lives; we need them. But we have no ceremony to say goodbye to possibility. No vows written to cherish and honor what could have been, til the past do us part.
The zip tied tables will be unclipped. The stickers torn away. But we can’t get that time back. We can’t just get it back. We never had it. And we never will. And no one knows how to say goodbye.
Like a miscarriage. The world wants to just move on. Yes, we know another child might come and even still we’re left in mourning. It is hard to stop loving what could have been.
I don’t know what collective grief looks like. I don’t know how to have a funeral for lost time.
But I hope, you have the grace to give yourself time for this nontraditional mourning we all seem to need. I hope you find your way. Writing these words are part of it for me. Share yours. We need it.