No email this week and Nora McInerny

There is no email today I'm afraid, because I'm away for the weekend with my brother's (Jim) family who are celebrating my sister in laws (Babs)...birthday. They are renting a house in or around Dent in Yorkshire and have invited me to join them. But I've a wee story to tell you before I push off. 

One of the consequences of being a relatively recent widower is the quality of the conversations that I find I'm having with friends and one such with Henriette, the widow of Simon Silverwood, of Silverwood Bakeware fame, occurred a couple of days ago. During this conversation she mentioned an American girl, now in her late 30's or early 40's, called Nora McInerny, who gave a TED Talk on grief and the story she tells is that in the space of two months in 2014 she lost a baby, her father and her husband, the latter two to cancer. Conversation stopping stuff. 

One of the aspects that struck me forcibly, aside from the fact that she makes watching her a pleasure (quite an achievement considering the content) is this. She discovers that she is not the only one who has a strong dislike of the phrase "Moving On" in the context "getting over" your beloved dead person. She says that we don't "move on" from grief, we "move forward with it". 

I haven't yet formulated the right words to describe the huge release that this statement has already allowed me. But a part of it, at any rate, is along the lines of "I don't, over time, have to gradually forget Babette, (move on) I can actually take her with me on my journey (moving forward with her), and you've no idea how comforting that is! 

If you are happy, in turn to cry and to laugh and to hear someone talk about what is taboo in our society, then take a risk and spend 15 mins 6 secs out of your day to watch this video. 

I hope you have a pleasant and peaceful weekend.

Andrew