The Precariousness of Passing Away
As I prepare to launch a whimsical book about grief and grace, both my own reflection and my social algorithm have reminded me how wide the spectrum of grief truly is. It has also reminded me how important it is to be clear about what Sailing with Angels is, and is not. To put a darkly comic lens on a moment of shocking loss, I think of something shared by my best friend from summer camp. She is the kind of person who can navigate just about any headwind and still land a joke in the middle of a squall.
After she lost her sister in a hiking accident, she cut straight to it, “Let’s talk about the term ‘passing away.’ It is not passing away when you fall off a cliff and can’t be reached for half a day. If you are ninety years old, surrounded by people you love, with rosary beads wrapped around your hands, I might allow it. Not today.” It was sharp, honest, and painfully poignant. She had a point. And it is the point.
A sudden loss, a loss that comes too early, places loved ones in a precarious position. It can gut you, freeze you, and transform life in ways you never saw coming. While I have not faced that kind of loss directly, I have stood on the sidelines supporting loved ones. As I have begun writing more, I have also tried to carve out time to listen and learn from creative and compassionate voices who help illuminate what those living through it face. Their perspectives are invaluable. Their voices matter. The resources built around that pain can be an invaluable resource.
Currently, All There Is by Anderson Cooper is on my podcast list, and Reimagining Grief by Kate Doerge is sitting in my shopping cart after being shared by Jenna Bush Hager on Instagram. I’ve just finished The Correspondence by Virginia Evans and Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks, both of which profoundly capture the heartbreak of a life taken too soon. Modern classics like The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion sit alongside films such as Terms of Endearment and Ordinary People, as well as enduring works like A Grief Observed by C. S. Lewis. I also return to a TED talk by a high school classmate’s wife, Susan Retik, reflecting on sudden loss after September 11th and the small choices that carried her forward.
The grief of losing a child, sibling, or friend too soon carries a shock that cuts differently. It fractures time itself and demands its own language, care, and compassion.
Sailing with Angels may miss that mark, and it is important to say so plainly. This book is not meant to hold sudden or tragic loss. It is meant to be a light on a long life lived, and on the quiet transition that comes when the people who once steadied us are no longer there. It speaks to the moment you realize you have become the adult in the room, often without noticing when it happened. It is a way to honor the parents, grandparents, and mentors who shaped us, to move forward while holding onto the laugh-out-loud, fill-your-heart memories that still surface, and to leave the door ajar so love, wisdom, and presence can continue to move through.
