In rememberance

Sneaking this in "under the wire", I wanted to post a few of my ruminations about the passing of my beloved Lola, 5(!) years ago, to the day.

I remember the following week being one in which I wore just about every skirt I owned — a definite rarity for someone like me, who tends to loathe being "girly". All of the funeral preparations meant that I felt the need to be dressed up for the duration of that week. The relative discomfort of the clothing I was wearing seemed to fit the feeling of disorientation I felt at the time.

The job I was slowly coming to despise got to be intolerable when I saw how calloused they were in regards to my mourning period. I felt rushed back to work and it was the very sizeable "last straw". This was the main reason I left the job that started my career. I learned the majority of my design skills at that job, and made some truly great friends there. The fact that my employer's reaction to the loss of my grandmother was what caused me to leave doesn't lessen the fact that I mourn that experience, too.

Really, there's a wide range of aspects of my existence that seems to have been catalyzed by my grieving. I'm still sorting out how much of it was over-reaction — on my part — and how much of it was completely reasonable. Generally, my policy is to treat almost any emotional reaction as completely valid, which effectively nullifies any blame I might have placed upon myself for my resultant actions. Suspiciously tidy, that.

I know that Lola would have been mortified to cause such upheaval in my, or anyone else's life, so I'm a little ashamed to admit that it's only now that I feel like I'm recovering from the fallout of her death. I've said it before, 'though, the impact that her passing caused is a tribute to how important she was to me, and undoubtedly everyone else whose lives she touched.

That said, I think next year I'll have to post about some of the positive influence she had on my life. :)