How much time does it take to lick a stamp? Quite quick isn’t it? When you think about it. The click of your fingers or the blink of an eye. All very familiar sayings for what a moment in our life can be as it passes us by. Moments in our life are a thought I had just now and it has inspired me to write a piece for thought.
A simple moment is all it takes to turn your entire world upside down, imagine the time it takes to lick a stamp is all it takes to take you from hero to zero or zero to hero. Which ever may be the better way to look at things right now in your life? The true constant in it all is that nothing will ever remain the same forever. I learned some tough lessons in life along my little small journey here on our planet and I have taken all my lessons well, to a point at least. Most of my writing, actually all of my writing journey stems from or has been brought about owing directly to the simple fact of how my world was turned upside down and I was taken from hero to zero in the blink of an eye. The time it takes to lick a stamp. I am aware that stamps are fact becoming a thing of the past and those that still use them today probably have a little damp sponge thing to wet the back of the little feckers with right there on their desk. And some of us know exactly how long it takes, others are simply to upscale to dare ever entertain the idea of placing the gummy side of a stamp on their tongue, how and ever it does show us a snippet of something that occurs quite quickly and is all over in one brisk motion.
I moved away from writing blog pieces about grief and loss some time ago because of the nature of developing how I put on to paper my own thoughts and I understand the subject of loss of a loved one is not something all have experienced yet in life. I began writing during stages of deep grieving of my own and it has helped in processing moments of pain and hurt through the grieving process. I have also used my writing to encourage others who are in places of hurt to take a peek from another angle and see how harsh times and hurt can lead and deliver us into some beautiful places in life. Though when any of us are going through it, we never see the possibility of recovering or ever finding a way out from our hurt and the pains of grief. Loss in life and the hurt of grief can be like no other ever and also something that many of us find very hard to put in to words. It is simply the nature of the beast, the beast being grief of course.
I began writing and this has helped me through many of my darker days. Part of the funny or strange piece of this is that tons and tons of what I may write for myself never goes to the public domain. I write for me first always. What I have offered as an idea to many is that whatever format or platform works for you to deal with your own emotions is something that can be magic. You may wish to sue art or make a piece of woodwork or write or plant something and spend a day in the garden. Whatever works for you to help and assist you to deal with your own feelings is worth pursuing. Some of the things that may work for you could be meditation or yoga, for another a walk in the park or to be around animals, whatever it is that works for you, go for it.
To normalise the subject of grief and to bring a written word into the world that says, you are not strange or weird or going crazy because you find it so difficult to grieve has been my own journey in writing and it is because I became a bereaved parent many years ago. I could not think straight and I could not process my emotions the way I had developed over the year prior to experiencing grief and deep pains of hurt that came with losing my children. I needed to find a way to make sense of things as do all of you who have experienced loss of a loved one. How do we cope? How do we help ourselves to be heard? In a state of not knowing how to communicate? The friends and family around us do not understand and society does not hold any special place for those of us who carry hurt and emotional pains of living with our grief. So what then? It is upon us to become the understanding ones as it is impossibility for our society to understand that which they have not experienced yet. We must develop ourselves to become a person of deeper understanding while we are grieving and we find it really difficult to even deal with our own self on a day to day basis all the while having to develop a whole new sense of self and survival skills to cope with some of the smaller tasks within our day. We must learn to understand that “they” (the masses) do not understand. I can honestly say that I have never been to any class in my school days where the topic or subject for the day was grief. I have never been to any after school programs where the topic or subject was grief either. I became a person who must develop myself at a later stage in life as a grown man, a person who must develop again with a whole new set of parameters and it has had many ups and downs ever since.
Why write today about this?
I have learned over the years that every day out there in the world there is somebody new joining the horribly world of grieving and have no clue what or why or how it is all supposed to happen and so the position of becoming stuck or frozen happens in the blink of an eye. I remember that in as much time as it takes to lick a stamp that I turned from a happy go lucky guy who loved to be in the business of being business to a shattered mess of a man who was a grieving father and a bereaved parent. Yes that fast is how long t took for me to be served this not so tasty dish. Like I said, I learned over the years and saw that there are many people who have become bereaved for their first day and the whole cycle is only beginning for them and I definitely could never wished such a journey on any of my worst enemies ever. My own levels of understanding had been set on a trail of development to understand why so many never understood what I was going through and could never really understand the pain I was in. By chance and without design I am an advocate for considering others and where they might be at with their own issues and that a level of understanding is required. I too learned and firmly believe that a new “normal” focused around grief is required in our own society of this modern time of 2024. Many will understand that it is not the norm because it is a taboo subject because those who are pushing on and paving the way in our society have yet to experience the loss of a loved one and so it will never be the huge open discussion and topic of conversation unless you find yourself in a rented room of a hotel or a special small conference room where a private meeting is taking place where the only requirement to be there is that you have become a bereaved parent. As they say inside of those type of meeting rooms, “The price of admission is too high and too costly”, why so? Because we had to bury our children to gain admission. That price is too high to have to pay for sure. The people reading this blog piece right now who have indeed had to go through some of what I have I have had to go through in their life will understand totally what I am talking about. For those of you who have read this far and may consider this grief world for a moment, then I ask of you to begin to step outside of self and see how there are many people in the world who are not lepers because they have lost their child or a very special loved one. They are human beings who are having the toughest time ever in their life and they have no answer or formula to deal with the loss and devastation that they are feeling. I did not make it so; it is simply the way it is.
How do we begin to normalise the whole grief concept and the idea of how we could be more gently with those who find it difficult? One does not really know. There is no formula for it. I write only to bring the idea to your mind for a moment and perhaps you will ponder it for a minute or more and understand that it might only last with you for as long as it takes to lick a stamp.
I do of course appreciate that you like share and follow this post and this can let me know that you are out there and that we can build together the normalising of it all. The best way for men to express themselves and not to say women do not need as much tender loving care also, though I, as a man can only speak from my own viewpoint. Appreciate you and keep going. The strength you are gathering is beyond what you may ever understand.
A.McNallyauthor.com 