1,900 hearts
I found this heart rock on a hike in Albuquerque with Travis this month. I added it to my 1,900th heart post on Instagram.
My thumb stopped scrolling on Instagram this morning when a photo appeared of a friend with her dad, the two of them smiling for a sitting-on-the-couch selfie and words about how she will miss him, his French toast, and other wonderful qualities he possessed. She said he passed away yesterday. I don’t know exactly what she is feeling and experiencing right now, and yet, I do know some things. I typed a comment on her post because I try to never wait long before saying something after I learn sad news. Then I started thinking about what I can do next to show her love in some way even though we live in different states and, in some ways, I can do nothing at all.
I am careful with words chosen to share with friends and family members experiencing loss. I try not to assume too much about their beliefs about an afterlife, how complicated (or not) their relationships were with the person who passed away, what their journey through grief will look like, and what they might need going forward. Mostly, I attempt to let them know I care and that everything they experience going forward is normal and personal. If it feels appropriate, sometimes - but not always - I will mention that they might continue to feel connected to their loved one in an unexpected way in nature, the same way I continue to feel connected to my loved ones through finding hearts everywhere.
Seeing posts of my friends’ parents passing away is becoming more frequent as we enter middle age, and with each loss, my heart aches a bit knowing what the future might hold for my friends in the coming days, weeks, and years. At some point, we all lose people we love; it is one of the most common facts in life. I remember my grandparents religiously reading obits until nearly everyone they knew was gone and would no longer show up in newspapers. Perhaps this is what it will be like for us on social media until the end of our lives, or the end of Facebook and Instagram. Those of us lucky enough to live long lives will someday become experts of our own grief, despite some deaths still taking us by surprise and breaking our hearts in ways we can never know until it happens.
I felt too young when my dad passed away despite knowing people who lost parents at earlier ages. Six years later, I still felt too young when I lost my mother-in-law and father-in-law, and our parents who passed away seemed too young to leave this life. Even now as people my age increasingly gain gray hair and face lines, it still seems like we are all too young to experience these losses. Maybe life and loss always feel this way - that life is too short and loss is always too soon.
When someone I know is grieving, I love hearing about the pieces of their loved one’s life that seem to be only theirs - the way a person loved lemons, or played practical jokes, or drank Dr. Pepper, or taught their kids to play softball, or loved the color turquoise, or played with their grandkids on the floor, or lived for days on the lake, or showed up to fix any electrical issue, or made excellent Dutch oven dinners like my friend posted today.
Today - before I saw my friend’s post - I planned to share the 1,900th post on my Hunting for Hearts Instagram page. Over the last couple of weeks as I thought about what I wanted to say with that post, I considered that there might be people who wonder why sharing heart photos is still important to me nine years after my dad’s death. In fleeting moments of insecurity, it’s easy to consider that some people may think I should have “moved on” by now and that I dwell on personal grief too much. In thinking through these possibilities, I arrived at the following:
Hunting for Hearts has long evolved from my grief story; it’s about many stories collected from family, friends, and strangers. Sometimes a friend will point their loved one my way, and that loved one who is experiencing loss might begin to see hearts everywhere, too, and then we are able to connect in a way that feels significant and impacts both of our continuous healing journeys in meaningful ways.
Finding hearts reminds me that we see what we want to see. In a world that claims to thrive on constant breaking news, social media, and hot takes, it’s sometimes easier to cling to what is sad, terrible, hopeless, and unchangable. So, if I am to share anything on social media at all, I want some of it - on a regular basis - to be about love and joy, even if that love and joy is experienced through grief. Capturing heart photos and sharing yours reminds me we can always see love even on - and after - the darkest days, and that love is worth working for.
It’s FUN finding hearts, sharing them, and receiving photos other people capture. Until I started seeing hearts, I had no idea they could end up … literally everywhere. In the last 100 posts alone, hearts have been found in coffee cups, all over Italy, on trees, as a crack in gouda cheese, in a massive spaghetti sauce fiasco, on an apple, and in a weed patch. Most of the hearts found and shared are not born out of grief memories, but from adventures, good meals, memory-making with kids, and ordinary days.
Most importantly, I know grief among the people I love and strangers I have yet to meet will continue to grow. As this grief grows, I want people to know there is a space for them that is welcoming of long-lasting bereavement, love, and community. From now until whenever this account ends, I know that on any given day I might open social media apps and see that a friend of mine has lost someone in their life who they adored, and I want to be someone who remains steady through the loss and will aim to meet them where they are at.
Grief is not something that makes me uncomfortable to discuss. Grief is a bridge that connects everyone and is a catalyst for healing. Sometimes people find and message hearts to me for months and years whether to help me, help them, or help us. Sometimes those connections fade with messages arriving less frequently, perhaps because that person’s situation has changed. It’s possible they have found other avenues for sharing and expressing their grief or they have chosen to keep their experiences to themselves or other loved ones. It is okay for any personal grief journey to look different from mine; some people find comfort in seeing hearts - or other signs - that remind them of loved ones, and others don’t. Some people are less vocal - especially on social media - about grief, and express it many other ways. I do not expect anyone to follow or continue to contribute to the Hunting for Hearts social media page forever. I simply want people to know that it’s here if it might help them. As I share these thoughts and the 1,900th Hunting for Hearts post, I’m sending my love to all of you - wherever you are and whatever you’re going through. May love find you right where you’re standing.
Most of the hearts found and shared on Instagram are not born out of grief memories, but from adventures, good meals, memory-making moments, and ordinary days.