Fellow sodden-foot traveller.

Photograph - Amy Dwight

They say that grief is like a heavy black cloak that covers you head to foot. Actually, I’ve not heard anyone say that, but that is the cliché. And yes, it’s true, there is a sort of darkness that pastes itself upon your skin, a tar like substance, so inseparable that you wonder if it has become you. While you’re in the midst of it, everyone else walks around, seemingly, painted with iridescent, almost glow in the dark paint compared to how you feel! And this comparison, true or not, only makes the feeling worse. The dreaded question of, ‘how are you?’ that floats from the mouths of the iridescent ones.

Will I ever feel normal again?

Will I ever really live again?

It doesn’t seem to matter how long it’s been since the grief struck, these questions just linger. They linger, because there is a truth there. You will never feel that version of “normal” again and life will not be lived as it once was. But take heart, fellow sodden-foot traveller.

Like sunlight on a mountain, something will break through these clouds and make itself known. A slither of hope that means we can hang on another day and maybe, just maybe, recognise the faint glow amongst the trees.