Thankfulness day 25

I'm thankful for grief.
If I didn't feel grief, it would mean nothing had touched me so deeply, with such love, or that I had never experienced such love and joy that it's loss would leave me...well, full of grief in that love's absence.

My father passed away unexpectedly last year at this time.  While I did not have the relationship with him that I wished I did, and though there are others who were closer and more connected with him, I miss him.  I miss knowing that my dad is there, even though he lived 3000 miles away and I hadn't really seen him in years, I knew he was "there".  And now he is not.

I'm thankful for the feelings of loss and grief, for the tears and the sadness.  It reminds me that I am indeed connected to others, that I have had relationships worth mourning, that my heart is alive and capable.  I can only have this grief and sadness, because I have had it's counterpart - joy, love, connection.

I miss you dad.