The pattern of Grief is a roller coaster ride. You never know what is coming day-to-day. There are good weeks and there are terribly bad weeks. I have recently made it through some of those terribly bad weeks that came with the one year anniversary of Riley’s death in May. I have moved into a feeling of numb but I am functioning. I am trying to recoop. I am trying to live. Once you go through one of the stages of grief, it doesn’t mean that you won’t ever feel it again. This I have learned. You might visit stages out of order, skip one, come back to another and repeat. My grief is not going anywhere. This I know.

This past weekend I attended The Great American Brass Band Festival in Danville, Kentucky. I took my chair and I planted myself on the grass with my camera in hand. What I saw around me were people of all ages eating ice cream, drinking drinks listening to music while sitting on the lawn. The stage was a gazebo. The backdrop was an old brick building, green grass, trees, pretty flowers with the sun going down and the fireflies blinking. As the bands played, children waved around light sticks. The patrons Moms, Dads, children danced close to the stage to the brass music from the bayou. The weather was perfect. The music was wonderful. Laughter echoed around me. I was thoroughly enjoying myself.

Staring at the band, I focused on the tuba player. Oh, so innocently, I thought… Riley would like this event. And there the sharp edge of grief snuck in. It crept straight to my eyes and they puddled. It leaked into my heart and it ached. It was a quick thought that turned into a slump of my shoulders, a limpness of my extremities and a squeeze of my heart. The joy of the moment was instantly replaced.

You see, Riley was a band kid. He had moved from the saxophone to the tuba his sophomore year of high school. He played the tuba well just like every other instrument he took interest in. On Friday nights, we sat in the stands at the football games to hear him play. Over the years we sat in the seats of the Chandler Center for the Arts for his orchestra concerts. I volunteered in the band’s booster club. Band was a part of Riley.

This being a brass band event, I noticed a lot of saxophones and sousaphones (tubas) in the parade the next day. That didn’t make me cry. I wasn’t crying all weekend. It’s just those moments that all of a sudden grab you and yank you down. Like on a trip to the grocery store I was in the frozen food aisle, I saw a frozen pizza made with white sauce and a memory of having dinner with Riley at a restaurant came to mind. He ordered pizza with white sauce. The instant memory of conversation and laughter during dinner that night hit me straight on. That evening we spent together eating pizza was not long before he died. It was a good night.

So in the middle of the store, in a split second my mind went from what do I need at the grocery store to Riley. The tears welled up in my eyes, they sneaked down my cheeks while I stared blindly at a cold glass door thinking about my dead son that I will never share pizza with again. People walked around me as I continuously wiped each tear until the tears ceased and then I resumed my hunt for the next item on the list.

The realization that this is my life is in my face. I will forever have thoughts of my son and subsequent tears. Riley was lost by a first time try of LSD bought online. My youngest boy who had a whole life ahead of him of college and a future is gone by a decision to mess with a drug.  This is my life now because of his decision and the consequences of it.

I am me, but I am not me anymore. It’s like rediscovering life with a hole in my heart. It is trudging through the poop, the waste, the knee-high water that rises in front of me. Like a tide it disappears and reappears. This is grief. It is my life in the absence of my son who was a part of me.

I miss that part of me so very much. I am here living this altered life I didn’t ask for. What I ask is that my grief not be in vain. That the loss this world has suffered by Riley not being in it anymore be a story to be told to young adults who are and will be faced with the decision to try a drug. It is what keeps me telling Riley’s story. It is what has nailed me to the seat of the ups and downs on this roller coaster ride. It is my hope that lives are saved by my speaking out.

I Love You, Riley.