She Lives Inside Me: Her Love Shines Through

One of my oldest friends from high school sent me a letter recently, sharing a memory of me giving her a hug when she came back to school after her mom had died. I’ve always known that we can’t say the right thing when someone is grieving. I also know that we choose how we show up for others when they are. I chose to hug my friend, and I love that over thirty years later she still remembers that moment. I never met her mom. I wish I had because I would have hugged her too. She birthed my friend into this world, and for that I am forever grateful.

As I started to pivot my business again, I wondered if I was on the right path. I’d have random conversations with strangers who would ask what I did for work, only to share that I was working as a grief and life transitions companion. I shared that I’d be hosting free grief circles and supporting people who are grieving. A space where they would not be bypassed or brushed aside, where they could tend to their grief.

The responses that people came back with surprised me. Some shared their grief stories, others talked about relationships that had shifted, how they still missed these close friends or partners, who were still alive, and no longer part of their lives. Some people’s eyes filled up with tears as they remembered their loved ones who died many years ago, and shared their memories. I was also told that they wished someone like me was around for them when they needed someone.

These conversations were like portals, where time stood still and something would shift. I could see and feel the magic in these moments. The love that they carried for the person who died or the relationship that ended. This person was still with them in their memories. The love shining through, these miracles I get to witness. The depths people go when they share with me, someone who listens, and meets them where they are. I see freedom in the space they inhabit, where they get to be exactly who they are.

My grandmother died on Thanksgiving Day in 2019. I didn’t find out until six months later. My aunt, my mom’s sister, chose to withhold my grandma’s death from the entire family. I was shocked. My mom was a mess, and as she grieved, she surprised me, telling me that I was not grieving my grandmother.

I was grieving. Even though my mom couldn’t see it, or I wasn’t doing it the way she thought I should be, I was hurting. I felt a lot of feelings. Anger was one, regret was another, and I also felt a lot of sadness. More feelings arrived as I sat with this new fact, that I would never see my grandmother again.

I grew up two states away from my grandparents. As far as I know, most of my extended family still lives in the city where I was born. Most of my memories of my grandparents come from photos and late-night drives due to medical emergencies. They were here for my high school graduation, I made a trip with my mom to visit at the end of summer when I was in college, and the last trip they made that I can remember was for my wedding in 2009. I saw them a few years later when I made a surprise visit and promised to go back. I never did, though. I thought I had enough time.

I found letters my grandma wrote me in Spanish, her first language. She was excited that I was learning the language and so she was helping me learn. I remember receiving and reading her letters, but I can’t recall if I ever wrote back.

After hearing of her death, memories came rushing in over the next few months. Seeing her wearing an apron I made her that she loved, her laugh, how she prayed the rosary every night before bed, watching her put her blush and lipstick on, the way she would gently pat her jet black curly hair, how she talked about the garden she loved so much and square dancing at the senior center.

When my grandfather died in 2023, I made the trip back to my birthplace, taking the three days of bereavement that work gave me, and spent some time with family. I spent hours wandering the Garden of Love in the cemetery, looking for my grandmother’s headstone. No one in my family knew exactly where she was buried. I finally found her with the help of a friend, practically tripping over grandma’s headstone under the trees.

It was August, and the city was experiencing record highs. I was melting, my head soaked in sweat under an umbrella that wasn’t helping. Beads of sweat ran down my body, soaking my clothes. Tears streamed down my face, my eyes burned from the salt. I could taste the sweat on my lips as I talked to my grandmother.

From where I was standing, I could see the Rocky Mountains, and really take in the beauty of this city that she and my grandfather had called home. A desert town I dreaded since childhood. It was always too hot and most of my memories were of hospitals. Standing there, talking to her, and looking around, it was the first time in my life that I saw and felt the warmth and beauty of this place. This city I was born in over forty years ago and for once, I felt like I was home. This place where I was loved and held and rocked to sleep the first three months of my life. Where my grandmother loved me and kept loving me.

I wondered if she picked this cemetery because of the view, if she had stood there long ago, looking around like I did, taking in so much beauty, and knew this was where she wanted to be buried. To be held in the warmth of the sun and the earth, the vibrancy of the desert sky, a row of trees nearby.

The sun started to set. I found a rock that was touching her headstone and put it in my pocket. Something to add to my altar where I kept a little statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe that called to me in a shop one day to honor my grandmother and remember her.

I spent time in local coffee shops where I wrote to her in my journal, something I’ve always done when I remember her, even before she died. I also ate at a local restaurant where she and my grandfather took me on my last visit to eat gorditas. She said they were the best in town.

I always thought grandma’s kitchen was magic. There wouldn’t be any food to eat, and if I told her I was hungry, she’d make chile rellenos. She loved her zucchini from the garden and I helped her make zucchini boats once. She had recipes she clipped from magazines and the newspaper filed away. I loved helping her cook and felt like I was learning all her secrets. When she chopped an onion, she’d wear special goggles so she wouldn’t cry.

My mom, brother and I made a trip down in the summer one year when I was in college. I was hanging out with her in the kitchen after she had made a trip outside to the backyard. She handed me a bowl full of fresh figs she had picked from her tree, and I gladly took one. I sat there holding the fig, feeling its texture, the soft and almost leathery skin. I smelled it and I had no idea how to eat it.

She walked out of the kitchen and when she returned, she asked me if I liked the fig. I told her I hadn’t tasted it yet because I didn’t know how to eat it, and wondered if I needed to peel it first. She laughed and said, “No mijita, you can just take a bite or put it in your mouth!” I ate the fig and told her I’d only ever had figs in Fig Newtons. We laughed, and then I gobbled up a few more. They were delicious.

I have so many memories of her and think about her every day. As I write this, more memories are bubbling up, and so are the tears. Sometimes I see her when I look in the mirror or when I see a curl on my own head that reminds me of hers. I hear her laughing almost every time I laugh. Memories on repeat: her shaking her hips in the kitchen, dancing and singing along to her favorite music, or gently swaying her hips when she would wash dishes – something I do too.

Both of us are May babies. I was almost her birthday present, welcomed into this world the day after her birthday. She had just turned 46, the age I am now. I wish I could remember her face as she held me for the first time, her kissing my head or my cheek, holding my tiny hands. I wonder what she smelled like and what song she sang to me in Spanish. I’ll never know.

I write to her, I talk to her, I remember her, and I miss her. My love for her continues on, and so does my grief. I grieve the time I spent with her, the time I didn’t, and all the moments in between. She lives inside me and all around me, and for that I am forever grateful.