certain poetry in that.
I still didn’t reach out.
Part of me wanted to.
The part that remembered the eighteen-year-old girl clutching my sleeve after Dad died.
But another part of me—newer, quieter—said, “Wait, make sure you’re walking towards something, not just falling back into old patterns.”
So I waited.
One Sunday in late October, I drove to the cemetery.
The morning air was sharp enough to wake me, while the sun was warm enough to soften it.
I parked near the old oak tree and followed the gravel path
