good. Grief.

good. Grief.

I swear nobody tells you that grief can physically take you out. 

If my mind was able to forget, the muscle memory in my body was not and would not have allowed me to forget what the day is. 

In actuality, even in the days leading up to today, it was like even though my mind was occupied my body was experiencing the trauma of 365 days ago. 

On January 26, 2020. The world lost a legend. 

Well two legends. 

But my family lost the legend that was my Aunt Mary Timm.

On this day in 2020 at 2:03pm my family was there for her as she took her final breaths in this physical world and left us for the beyond. 

Mary had just recently retired and had not been sick a day in her life as she would tell you herself. She was in good health and great spirits, we were even planning a trip to Europe in September, so her death was a shock to us all. 

Just as shocking and jarring was when we walked out of the room and we were met with the news of Kobe Bryant's passing. 

Mary was 62. Kobe 42. They had both just retired. They had both worked so hard and sacrificed so much so they could retire and live their dreams. They had so much they wanted to do and so much life left to live, but it all ended on that fateful Sunday. 

I know this is cliché, but it's cliché for a reason. 

Tomorrow is promised to no one. Not one of us is owed the next second. Each breath we take is a gift and what we choose to do with it is all that matters. No one could have predicted that something as common as an enflamed gallbladder would be fatal. No one gave a second thought to how dangerous getting into that helicopter that Sunday morning would be. None of know and none of us have any control of any of it. 

The only thing we can control is how we move in this second. What we are are going to do with every minute we are given. That's all we got.

What are you going to do with it?

I miss my Aunt every day. She was a way better human than me and I strive every day to be just a little like her. I learned so much from her and I am sad every day that we have no more time together. 

But I am also grateful and thankful for the time we did have together. For my Mary, the unofficial Mayor of Orlando, touched the lives of so many and left a mark on every person she met. She spent her time helping whoever she could and offering an ear to whomever was in need. She walked with the weight of the world on her shoulders and you couldn't tell. She made a decision to use and spend her time wisely, and we're all the better for it. 

So on this day every year, when I definitely could be curled up in a ball crying my eyes out because I miss her so much, I am making a choice. I am choosing to instead of letting my grief bring me down, I will use it to build up myself and others. I am choosing to remember all of the good times we had together and as reminders to live in every moment and appreciate them like they are my last.

I am choosing to use my time wisely too.

​I am choosing to allow this grief to guide me to be a better version of me and to be a little bit more like my Aunt.

Mary Timm.

Good. grief.