“Contrary to what a lot of people believe (or hope), comfort doesn’t take the pain away. Comfort slides in beside the pain, pulling up a chair so that we have something more than sorrow in our hearts. Comfort gently expands our spirits so that we can breathe again. Comfort opens our eyes so that we can see possibility again. And on those days, whether it is the next day or five years removed, on that day when grief rears its dark head again, comfort helps us remember that pain is not all there is”

“It's easier to miss her at a cemetery, where she's never been anything but dead, than to miss her at all the places where she was alive.”

“I feel a flash of grief so intense it almost makes me cry out: not for what I lost, but for the chances I missed.”