I’ve been pretty up front about the way I feel about taking Daniel off to Michigan last weekend. It was hard, but it was exactly right. But the feeling I’ve had since that time has unquestionably been one of grief. I’ll miss both my children, but it’s not so much that they aren’t here as it is a time of life passing by. No mid-life crisis…in fact, it seems more profound than that. A settled realization that a moment in time is gone. All the small details of that little girl and little boy that used to climb up my legs to do a flip are now gone, lost to memory. Don’t mean to be melodramatic, but that’s just what it is. I tend to dive into thoughts like that, for better or worse, lingering in them, brooding over them. It’s a rich feeling, not all sad by any means, more like a deeply textured work of art encountered, taken in, and at the same time the explosion of appreciation comes, that all too familiar ache comes along, bundled with the joy.
Beauty is like that.
And that’s what my time with Amy and Daniel has been.
Beautiful…
JEFF BERRYMAN 