An Unexpected Trigger | The Magnitude of Loss

Grief and light live side by side. Both belong. Both carry me forward.

September 13, 2025

I didn’t know what I was walking into.

A storytelling event.

Five voices, gathered to celebrate Ketchikan’s 125th anniversary.

I thought I was just going to listen.

Be entertained for a little bit.

But then the stories began.

And woven into them was my family, our store, our legacy.

It cracked something open in me I hadn’t expected.

Grief poured in like a tide.

Because the loss of our store was never just a store.

It was the loss of my family’s name carried forward,

the loss of the place that held our community together,

the loss of connection to my dad,

the loss of my anchor to history and heritage,

the loss of my purpose and identity.

And the truth is,

The store’s loss was only the beginning.

From there came more heartbreak:

My sense of belonging.

My family unit I relied on.

My dad’s death,

The explosion of what I believed was love, safety, & forever.

The battles I fight now as I try to serve this community on the school board

in a time that feels impossible.

The magnitude of it all rose around me like a storm.

I left the event and cried.

I couldn’t hold back the waves of it—

because sometimes the only honest thing you can do

is let your body release what your spirit has been carrying.

And I remind myself,

I am still here.

Even as I cry, I am rebuilding.

Even as I grieve, I am creating.

Even as the tide of loss pulls at me,

I am stubbornly, relentlessly, persistently moving forward.

This is what resilience looks like:

tears and grit,

loss and creation,

grief and an unquenchable spirit

all woven into the same human heart.

And it is hard.

Yesterday, I spent the morning wrapped in the magic of life and possibility.

Today, grief I thought I had already processed hit me hard in an unexpected place.

This is the duality of my life—

to hold both wonder and sorrow,

to be pulled by loss and pulled by life,

sometimes in the very same breath.

And maybe that is its own kind of strength,

to keep saying yes to both,

and to keep walking forward,

trusting that every tide that rises and falls

is carrying me closer to the horizon that is mine.