Sunrise

My sunrise routine has changed abruptly. As some of you may know from my TikToks and Instagram and even this blog, my dogs and I have a morning routine, or had a morning routine. A few weeks ago, my youngest bullmastiff, Buck, had to be euthanized unexpectedly; so he is no longer with me in the mornings snuggling up to me—or more accurately, trying to convince me that he was a 132 pound lap dog competing for my attention over his sister Annie. It was invasive, a tad exasperating (I only have two hands unlike that one HIndu goddess), at times truly suffocating (you try and breathe with 132 pounds of dog pressing on your chest and vital organs), and my favorite time of day. Now, it’s just Annie who curls up beside me and even with no Buck to fight for my lap, she resolutely takes up just my lower legs for her head as if fully expecting Buck’s FOMO self to take up his required 110% of everything else. The lack of a bully head being shoved into my face or under my arms/hands, or no smeared lens from the plethora of stickky wet Buck kisses all over my face and neck, or just the loss of his exapserated grunt of defeat before lyinng down on top of my right side before the sounds of his snores reverberated off the family room walls, reminds me every morning now that my life is missing someone. So, sunrise is not the same and every morning I am reminded of my loss.

Loss isn’t a foreign concept to anyone, and we all handle its effects differently. (I have been avoiding sunrises—at least these past few weeks.) It can also flare up unexpectedly from the simplest of reminders, causing us to fall down that rabbit hole one morrer time. Yesterday, I was going to call my niece and in my phone contacts, her name was right above my Aunt Mary’s, which reminded me of a significant loss to my life last fall—the death of my aunt and uncle, two people who had been so significant in my life. I am who I am in part because of both of them. They helped shape me and their presence, while physically thousands of miles away but only a short phone call or text, was grounding. Unfortunately, they both passed within a few months of each other last fall and those phone calls and texts can no longer happen. I could no longer make a phone call and hear my uncle’s booming voice exclaim, “Well, hello, Krissy.” Or send my aunt an update text with a picture and get an immediate response that always ended with “I’m so proud of you. I love you.” There’s a void. Seeing my aunt’s name in my contacts brought that loss right back to the surface, especially since I know that most likely someone else now has their numbers. Someone who probably never met them, never knew and will never know what phenomenal people they both were, how central they were in my life and the lives of others.

No one goes through life without feeling loss and how we cope defines us. We can persevere, keep putting one foot in front of the other. We can wallow and never fully emerge from the dark abyss, which has several outcomes: bitterness or hopelessness being the most common. We can honor them, molding their memories and legacies into our own framework. Or it could be a combination of several of these. That’s what you see in many of my characters in my books. They’re all shaped by their losses. Tarin’s loss of his father manifests in his refusal to take the title of king and his relentless stubbornness, especially in throwing himself into battles to protect his friends and family and kingdom regardless of the odds against him. Syllé’s losses manifest in determination and a stubborn resolve that can form into vengeance in certain situations. Halicyon’s almost caused him to turn his back on the Light and fall into a deep pit of hatred; but he used his losses to laser focus his actions towards honoring those he lost, especially his wife, Dol’kah. The Dréor weren’t able to overcome their losses and they became the Dark, feeding off its coldness and bitterness to fuel them. My books are an exploration of how our losses can affect us, change us, strengthen us, and/or bring us down.

I can’t fill the void that has been left by what and who I have lost; and my sunrises will never be the same again. However, I can continue to experience them and build a new routine. Not the same, never the same, but that’s life. Nothing ever stays the same because life moves forward constantly whether we wish it to or not.