Grief is: missing your pandemic partner. Your trauma buddy. The person you process your decisions with. . . .
Being in a global crisis has put all of us in uncharted territory. There’s no handbook for handling quarantine and all the physical and emotional fallout from a world upside down.
I know Micah wouldn’t have had any solutions, or a cure for COVID, that would have made this all better. But he would have brought presence. He would have had opinions. He would have been a sounding board and the consistent point of reference he always was for me.
Some of you may know that Micah was a germaphobe 🦠😬. He wouldn’t eat leftovers after 36 hours in the fridge. He often declined my kisses if he was nervous about catching a cold (regardless of if I had symptoms 🤦🏻♀️) And thanks to his leftover stash, the Flick home didn’t need more hand sanitizer when everyone was hoarding 👌🏼
Being a first responder and a germaphobe, you can be sure Micah would have been the guy in the hazmat suit in Costco. I’m sure it would have raised his anxiety and made him more vigilant.
I don’t idealize that his presence would have brought transcending peace into our quarantine. But I miss the man I would have talked about conspiracy theories with. I miss the man who I would have complained about my new homeschooling gig to. I miss his reassuring hugs that all of this would settle. I’m also sure he would have created some silly games from scratch for us to play in our house, like he always did when we were bored. ♥️
Healthy grief doesn’t idealize our lost loved one into a perfect person they never were. But it honestly evaluates all the gifts they brought to our lives and mourns those missing pieces.
Micah, you had much to give and you are so loved and so missed.
