My daughter called me last night. The phone was filled with the sounds of blind, depthless sobbing. I will not forget the sound anytime soon.

Her friend had been found dead. Her roommate. Someone she spoke with and texted daily. A week prior she had marveled at this woman’s ability to still be “trusting to a fault and ridiculously loving.”

Someone, like her, who was trying so bloody hard to get to that better place.

I don’t care for the saying “they are now at peace.”
They may be. But we should not be.
Let there be peace when we all have a fair shot at obtaining it.

My daughter took half a day from work. She curled up with a migraine and threw up for a few hours in her darkened bedroom. And then she got up. She went back to work caring for the thirteen other women in her sober home.

If there is a eulogy I hope it foregoes words of peace and instead honors the struggle. An exhausting struggle that can only be endured with ridiculous amounts of love. And even then, many don’t make it. It’s hard to find peace in that.