Tupperware

Dean's grandmother passed away Saturday evening. It was something we were anticipating, she's been in hospice care for a couple of weeks now. What I wasn't anticipating was the rush of emotions that hit me like a train traveling 100mph. I can't remember the last time my throat closed up like that, my chest felt that heavy, or I was that emotionally out of control. Adding insult to injury is that I wasn't upset about his grandmother, I barely knew the woman. I was upset about my own grandmother.
Five and a half years ago my own grandmother died of cancer. Until then, the woman had been the rock of my life, the only decent parent I've ever known. Her transition from this world to the next took place at home, over the course of 30 days while I attended to her with the help of hospice. Without those 30 days to say goodbye, I doubt I would have been able to function after her death. It's a silly thing, really. It's been five years and there is little reason for the flood of emotion I had last night but it did remind me of something.
When I was in high school, a friend of mine lost her sister in a tragic car accident and I remember her telling me "they say it takes seven years to get over the loss of someone close to you." At the time I'd never lost anyone close and seven years seemed an impossibly long time. Couldn't you be fine after a year? Most people seemed fine after six months. How could it possibly take seven years? I guess I've got a better idea of that now and my mind struggles to understand it even today as I feel as though my heart was broken anew.
Last night, it was as if someone had opened the lid on some tightly sealed container I had in the back of my heart. It's the container we all have, the one we shove the bad stuff into, the things we need to shove away to retain our sanity and be able to move on with our lives. At the moment we shove things into that container we mentally tell ourselves we will be back, we will deal with it in a little while after we've had a chance to breathe. Do we ever really go back on our own? Five years after my grandmother's death I've only had that container opened a few times and each time it has hit me so strongly that I'm left to wonder if that container is the right choice. If I take it out and air it, will the wound heal?
I don't know.
All I know is I wish I could get the lid back on it.