Choices

How quickly my brain fired. How I sprang into action when I read the letter that began with, "I am sincerely and profoundly sorry to put you through this..." and ended with, "I will kneel before God..." My counselor told me that as humans we only have 3 choices when faced with a true crisis: fight, flight, or freeze. Feeling confused, I asked her, "So what did I do?" She looked at me with such compassion and said gently and softly, "You fought. You and Tim both did. And you've been fighting for Matt all along."

But now my brain is molasses. Keeping clean underwear and vegetables in the house is enough of a challenge. Life marches on. Tim and I both have work we need to do, and the holidays approach. I will choose to fight through all this, too. I may not be as ambitious as I am some Christmas seasons, but Matt wouldn't want me to give up. He'd want me to delight in the company of my friends, make jam and candy, and decorate my house.

The twinkling lights of a Christmas tree will be bittersweet again this year. But we'll fight. We'll fight to find joy, fight to show love to one another, fight to keep Matt's memory alive by making our own memories and celebrating this life we've been given to live.

We'll keep fighting.