Boom!

No one takes a good picture of fireworks.

There. I said it. Out loud. This controversial statement to end all controversial statements.

God, I wish that were the kind of controversy currently beating down the souls of humanity. But stay with me - my intention is to leave a little hope bomb for your consideration.

When I say grief has been “a passenger in my van and a singer in my band” these past few months, I mean the kind of passenger you’re pretty sure is going to throw up all over your freshly cleaned upholstery, and the kind of singer who keeps belting that one song from 1983 that bruises your ears and guts you every single time. Grief is center stage right now, and it is singing so loudly.

In the span of too short amount of time, two remarkable humans I loved and adored have died, and a third sits in that waiting room known as hospice care - quietly saying her goodbyes, settling her accounts before heading out toward whatever comes next.

With this last soul, I know that going first is an act of generosity on her part. Not just because she is past eighty, or because cancer has visited her not once but twice, but because she is the kind of human who would organize the most spectacular luncheon or event - coordinated colors, a theme, gift baskets to send home, beautiful floral arrangements - and make absolutely certain everyone felt welcome, seen, and considered. You want her on your team. You will win whatever the race is, and you will do it spectacularly, with excellent snacks.

So what does any of this have to do with bad pictures of fireworks?

Here’s what:

We do not get to choose how or when we arrive. We do not, for the most part, get to choose how or when we depart. Our choices live in the in-between. They are the daily, day-in-day-out decisions - to stay or to go, to love or to hate, to witness or to participate. To forgive. To tend the garden. To make and share the meal. To walk the dog in the rain, learn a new skill, release a toxic relationship, take the trip, cut your hair (or not), enjoy one more slice of cake, soak in the bath, run through a sprinkler.

We get to choose the moment-to-moment living, and that includes choosing to stand in the full force of an awesome moment - the word used correctly, intentionally - and simply take it in. The light. The noise. The smell. The feeling. The electricity of the crowd and the quiet of the pauses in between. To be present in the moment. Not trying to snap a photo of it, or a video, or any other caught image of something with so much force and movement.

You have force and movement. Be in it. Fully.

What I keep returning to in these desperate days of loss - and please don’t mistake this for casualness, because I mean it with everything I have - is something I wrote in the dark-early-o’clock hour recently: “...well, if I’m not dying, then I better be living.”

There it is. Plain as the black ink on the lined page where I left those words.

I am choosing to live.

If I’m not dying in this moment, then I’m lighting the match.

( Boom! )

Love y’all,
Tiff