falling back into memory

this time last year: we were at her side as much as we could possibly be. it was not necessarily pleasant. we (all) were wishing hoping praying pretending there was some other way out for mesa, while her human decline only accelerated. it was silly to imagine she might make it. but we did imagine that. we wanted that to be possible. we clung to the possibility.

looking ahead at the next two weeks feels like Lent to us --- we are walking the signs of mesa's death, reliving each step, each stumble, each fall. ah, the memories are so bitter and so sweet --- she was still here, and she was suffering so much.

oh, she was our friend. our dear sister and heart's mate. we felt it, and there was agreement --- our birth signs, our star charts, our life's paths, our love for each other.

mesa we are missing you tonight. the pain of the last year is building up, and all we can lean on is the truth that you are certainly beyond your pain now, hopefully beyond our pain, and free in the way that only the dead or the never-born can be free.

"per aspera ad astra"