We have become citizens of a new world.  One night, during our sleep, we were evicted from the world that we knew and loved and had lived in all our lives.  We found ourselves in a land where nothing was familiar.  We recognized no landmarks and without compass or map, felt disoriented and confused.  We had no tools, no skills, no language and no desire to be there.  So we started walking in search of warmth, shelter and survival.  Along the way we were able to fashion a few tools from the scraps we had been allowed to bring from our past life and we managed to learn a thing or two, some from books and some the hard way.  We hope it’s enough to buy us some time.

So here we are in a world not of our choosing, where peace of mind, comfort and happiness are only memories from another life, and going home is not an option as our old world is gone.  So we walk on, certain that we’ll be walking for the rest of our lives. But we are grateful to be moving out of the deep, dark woods of profound, new grief and moving towards the more light-filled open meadows of the future where we hope to rebuild our lives and regain some peace, some comfort and some happiness.  It will never feel like the home we knew and loved, but it’s all we have now.  Turns out, you can’t go home again.

It has been 78 days and nights and we are surviving, if not yet thriving.

If we know in our hearts that your soul survives, we can do this.  We can live our lives in relative peace with the promise of reunion one day.  I know that’s what you want for us because it’s what I’d want for you.  I love you today as always.  xxxooo, Ma

“They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it.  Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas;  they live in one another still.”              – William Penn