Broken Hearted Runner

It's been a year since tragedy struck our home and I've spent some time digesting what that means for our family. As I wake up today, a federal holiday, I am happy to have all of my family under one roof. But the reality is, the only reason we are all home is because there is a memorial service planned for their father today. And losing a father is no reason for celebration. Fathers are a lot of things. Each family has different needs and expectations for the man who fills this role. In Norman Rockwell's world fathers were the breadwinners, disciplinarians, and baseball coaches. They were big, burly men who wore suits or uniforms and left the house only to return and sit at the head of the table. They drove the family around in the big car and carved the turkey on Thanksgiving. But some fathers are not so traditional. Like people, some fathers are quite different in what they can provide to their family. Brian was one of those non-traditional fathers. He was not the b...

Written by Ceci Harding  On the night of October 8, 2017 my family and I sat around the coffee table playing The Game of Life . Little did we know at that same time, 87 miles away, the game of life that we knew was crashing off track. Brian Michael Harding March 23, 1774 - October 8, 2017 I woke the next morning to the sound of my mother calling me and my siblings to breakfast. It was Columbus Day so we didn’t have school. I groaned and crawled out of my bed, tiredly walking down the stairs. We all sat at breakfast while my mom told us her plan for the day and asked what we were doing on our day off. Then, after finishing breakfast, my siblings and I went to our rooms to go back to sleep and my mom went to her boyfriend’s house. It was less than 30 minutes later when I heard the front door open again. I was confused as to why my mom was back so quickly, and even more confused when I heard her yelling in a shaky voice, “Logan, Cecilia, Eve! Come here! Like – right here!” ...

I'll be honest, I've never known anyone close to me to die, so when Brian passed last year, I got my first dose of what it was like. The only way I can explain it is this - Grief is like being pushed off the high dive while you're wearing a super big sweatshirt, heavy jeans, and boots (because you weren't expecting to and you don't even want to swim). And the pool is filled with scary, painful, unknown, angry and sad feelings that soak into your clothes and pull you under repeatedly. And as you're struggling in all of that - totally accepting that you're here but still barely gasping for air - you look outside the pool and see all of the happy and fun memories sitting in the lounge chairs. And even though you want to enjoy those memories, somehow the angry and sad feelings have soaked through your clothes and just weigh you down - pulling you even deeper into the pool making those happy memories a part of the struggle. Yeah - that's pretty much it. B...

I once bought a shower curtain because the man I was in love with told me that he thought it looked like me. It was a beautiful bohemian print - brightly colored orange and teal and royal blue and yellow and pink. It had more colors than I thought could possibly be put in one design. It resembled a paisley - no - a peacock. It was abstract. And it was happy. I wanted to look the way that this shower curtain made me feel. I wanted to be that beautiful. I couldn't understand what it was about the design that he thought looked like me. I would have never looked at it and thought that it belonged to me or had a place in my house. But I wanted to be as beautiful as that shower curtain. And even more than that, I wanted to be the person that he saw when he looked at me - the person that resembled this curtain. I still own that shower curtain. Every morning I look at it and I think of the day I bought it. I think of the look on his face when he told me that I was as beautiful and as...

This morning I was driving into work talking on the phone with a friend. We were actually discussing the weather because of the big snow storm headed our way. I admitted my lack of awareness as to how much snow she would be getting and I said to her, “I have no idea what your weather is. I don't have much of a clue as to what is going on outside of my little world. I live in a box and I like it that way. I’m comfortable in by box. It's cozy and safe in here.” I said this as a joke. It was a vague generalization about my feelings towards politics and media these days. I personally try to stay away from most news because it all causes my blood to boil. I was individualizing myself and my problems from the reality of the world in which we all live. I followed it up with, “You know, just like Trump wants to put America First? I choose to put me and my family first.” Within 30 minutes, I was getting notifications about a school shooting in my home town of Great Mills, MD. ...

Sometimes not making a decision is a decision within itself. Sometimes doing nothing at all is a very strong statement. And sometimes, no matter how much you want something, you want something else even more. I want it all but I get nothing. I am a slave to my own freedom. I fear what I don't know and I know exactly of what I am afraid. Simply put - life goes on. It is nonsense to think or to even believe that any of us have any control over any of it. We can define the things that have meaning to us, but we cannot explain why they matter. We can do something or we can do nothing, but all of it is in vain because the sun will rise and the sun will set and everything else around us will continue on. So must we also. Just because the words aren't written doesn't mean the story goes untold. Stories have a way of telling themselves. They live out their words through deeply engrained memories and they tell us tales from our past as we move towar...