I don’t love and connect with the car I drive, the meal I put on the table each night, or the clothes I put on my back. I love and connect with people. I’m trying to understand my reactions to inaction so I can soften my jagged edges. As time goes on, I’m learning more about the dynamics of relationships and really appreciate the amazingly kind people who have remained and those who have arrived in my life since Ben died. People are my sounding board, my source of comfort. They allow me to work through my emotions. They act as a mirror of love, if you will. When I am face to face with the “I don’t know how to reach out to you” or the “I can’t handle that kind of pain” people, the ones who choose or feel as if they have to stay away, for whatever reason, it’s as if I’m up against a silent wall, left standing……alone and bewildered. Those situations leave me with the feeling that I do not exist therefore my grief does not exist therefore Ben did not exist. Instead of trying to bounce off those silent walls, I am beginning to understand that maybe those walls are not hard and unyielding, unloving. They may be silent because they are loving and soft and afraid, either for me or for themselves. And I can look at each silent wall from a different angle and feel compassion, as the silence continues, as I learn to accept.