Grief has a way of showing up uninvited.
You can be doing fine. Functional. Focused. Even joyful. And then something small happens. A smell. A date on the calendar. The way the light hits water. And suddenly grief settles on your spirit like it’s always lived there, like it never actually left, just waited.
That’s how it’s been with my grandfather.
His name was Ira Croney. He was born February 1, 1920, in Kentucky. He served his country during World War II. After the war, he settled in San Francisco, built a life, raised five children, and became “Papa Croney” to my brother Paul and I, who learned what it meant to belong just by being around him.
Papa Croney taught me how to fish. Not just how to cast a line, but how to be patient. How to sit still without needing to fill the silence. He taught me how to drive, which was really his way of teaching me trust and responsibility. And in a thousand quiet ways, he taught me what it meant to be a man. Not loud. Not performative. Steady. Present. Reliable.
He met my children. He held them. He saw the next generation with his own eyes. And in his final days, I took care of him. Not from a distance. Not with avoidance. I was there. I fed him. Sat with him. Watched him fade. Loved him through it.
That kind of love changes you.
And grief doesn’t always show up right away when love like that ends. Sometimes it waits. Sometimes it comes in waves years later, when you least expect it. When life has moved on enough that your guard is down.
Grief Is Not Just Sadness
One of the lies we tell ourselves is that grief is just crying. Just sadness. Just missing someone.
Grief is deeper than that. Grief is the body remembering attachment. It’s love with nowhere to land. It’s memory colliding with absence. It’s the nervous system saying, Something that mattered is gone, and I don’t know where to put that yet.
That’s why grief doesn’t ask permission. It doesn’t care how “strong” you are. It doesn’t check whether you’ve already mourned. It doesn’t operate on a timeline.
It just arrives.
And when it does, it can feel heavy. Not dramatic. Heavy. Like gravity increased without warning.
Remembrance Is Not the Same as Being Stuck
There’s a difference between remembering and ruminating. Between honoring and being consumed.
Remembering Papa Croney doesn’t trap me in the past. It roots me. It reminds me where I come from. It reminds me that I was shaped by someone who knew how to live with integrity, who understood commitment, who didn’t run when things got hard.
Remembrance becomes a problem only when it has no container. When memory just floods without form.
That’s where ritual matters.
Ritual gives grief a place to go.
It doesn’t have to be religious. It doesn’t have to be elaborate. It just has to be intentional.
Sometimes my ritual is fishing. Standing near water. Letting my body remember his presence without forcing my mind to explain it. Sometimes it’s telling a story about him out loud. Sometimes it’s saying his name on his birthday. Sometimes it’s sitting quietly and letting the ache be there without trying to fix it.
Ritual says, This mattered. This still matters. And I am allowed to carry it with care.
Love Does Not Expire
One of the hardest truths about grief is that it exists because love doesn’t stop when someone dies.
We don’t grieve strangers this way. We grieve people who shaped us. Who witnessed us. Who stood in our story long enough to leave fingerprints.
Papa Croney didn’t just teach me skills. He gave me a template for presence. For steadiness. For showing up without needing applause. That kind of love doesn’t vanish when a body does.
It transforms.
Sometimes into gratitude. Sometimes into ache. Sometimes into a quiet longing that shows up when you least expect it.
That’s not weakness. That’s attachment doing what attachment does.
When Grief Gets Too Heavy
There are moments when grief stops being reflective and starts becoming oppressive. When it weighs down your chest. When it shortens your breath. When it bleeds into everything else.
That’s when buffers matter.
Buffers are not distractions. They are supports. They are the things that keep grief from becoming isolation.
For me, buffers look like this. Letting someone know I’m missing him instead of pretending I’m fine. Moving my body instead of staying frozen. Being near water. Touching something solid. Grounding myself in the present when memory pulls too hard.
Sometimes the buffer is simply naming it. Saying, I’m grieving today. Not because something new happened, but because love resurfaced.
Grief doesn’t need to be solved. It needs to be held.
And no one should have to hold it alone.
What I Know Now
I know now that grief is not a sign that something is wrong with me. It’s evidence that something was right.
I know now that remembering my grandfather doesn’t pull me backward. It reminds me who helped build me.
I know now that ritual protects memory from becoming overwhelming.
And I know now that grief will visit again. Because love doesn’t disappear. It echoes.
Papa Croney’s life still speaks in the way I show up. In the way I parent. In the way I sit with people at the end of their strength. In the way I understand manhood not as dominance, but as care.
Grief found me again.
And instead of pushing it away, I’m letting it sit. Not forever. Just long enough to honor what it came from.
That feels like love.
That feels like remembrance.
That feels like him.
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