Looking Back and Looking Forward: Grieving in the pandemic year
What picture comes up for you when you remember holiday celebrations from your past? Thinking of this week between Christmas and the New Year, do you think of warm laughter, sparkling lights, toasts, togetherness? Or a strained atmosphere and waiting for inevitable conflict to break out around the table or at the party? Or maybe you remember lonely days, painful to remember. The holidays are always a tender time, especially after a loss. Now, in 2020, after this year of traum
Seeking solace in nature while we grieve: What to look for
When I walk the trail at my nearby forest preserve, it takes me back to the nature walks that my mother and I took as I grew up. We went to Dan Ryan Woods (named for a Chicago politician of course – this was Cook County), nestled not far from the busy 95th Street commercial district. Inside the woods, going from plant to plant, learning their names and habits, I might as well have been in Mom’s native environs, the Smoky Mountains. As I learned to recognize the Jack-in-the-pu
