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Grief is sneaky. You think you know what it looks like: loud, dramatic, cinematic, deep wails and existential monologues in darkened rooms. But more often than not, grief is a quiet thief, stealing small things in the middle of an otherwise normal day. A phone call you instinctively reach out to make. A laugh you think you hear but don’t. A recipe that will never taste the same again because the hands that first made it for you are gone.
My mother-in-law recently passed away, and it got me thinking about all the ways a loss like this ripples out into relationships, memories, and the very structure of a family. The death of a matriarch is more than the loss of a person. It’s the end of an era and a shift in gravity—the center of the family changes. And sometimes, we don’t even realize how much we were orbiting around that center until it’s gone.
She was the keeper of certain traditions, the holder of family history, the one who remembered birthdays and made sure people showed up. She was also a mother, a grandmother, a great-grandmother, a wife, a friend, someone who grounded the people around her in ways that can’t be easily replaced—a presence. The loss has sparked a reorganization. A reshuffling of where people stand, who takes on what, and whether certain bonds hold or fray.
With long goodbyes, sometimes we don’t realize we’ve been saying it until it’s over.
Close to those final days, I found myself looking at her in a way I never had before, not just as the woman I knew but as the sum of all the years she lived before I ever met her. The young woman she once was, the mother she became, the battles she fought, and the choices she made. I found myself wondering: Did she know she was the glue? Did she know how much she mattered? Do any of us?
Losing a matriarch forces a family to take inventory. Who are we without her? Who steps up? What stays and what fades? It’s an invitation (or a demand) to reevaluate what family means now.
It reminds me that families are ecosystems, not static structures. They shift, they evolve, and sometimes they break and rebuild. And when someone who shaped that ecosystem is gone, we either adapt or drift.
So now, in the wake of her passing, I wonder what we hold on to and what we let go. Which traditions are worth keeping, and which were only sustained by her presence? Who carries her lessons forward, and in what ways? We will figure it out, as many families have done. We will grow into the new version of us.
And maybe the biggest lessons in all of this are that we don’t have to wait until someone is gone to recognize their impact on us and our little worlds; that the long goodbye can start long before the end, if we just pay attention. And that we don’t have to wait until we’re forced to change to acknowledge our gratitude for what was and look at the possibilities of what can be.
Left vs. right. Urban vs. rural. Boomers vs. Gen Z. The media loves this binary stuff. Social platforms push it. Political parties fundraise off of it. And the rest of us? We’re too busy arguing about gas prices and pronouns to see that we’re being played.
The division we see everywhere isn’t accidental. It’s not just politics—it’s strategy; it’s manufactured. And it’s making a lot of people very rich and very powerful.
The people in charge of large parts of how we live and what we have access to—billionaire CEOs, media moguls, lobbyists, corporate PACs, career politicians on both sides of the metaphorical aisle who’ve been in office longer than I’ve been alive—all benefit when we’re too busy punching sideways instead of looking up.
We’re being distracted by each other’s differences while the people in power pass laws, write policies, and make decisions that keep wages low, healthcare inaccessible, education uneven, and rights negotiable.
It’s not an accident that we’re in this place; it’s part of a playbook. They’ve got us fighting over TikToks and X posts while they gut social safety nets and funnel wealth to the top.
Unfortunately, it’s working. People ghost family members over who they voted for. We stop talking to neighbors over yard signs. We let headlines and algorithms define who we trust and who we don’t. We’ve confused political disagreement with moral failing. We’ve lost the ability to sit across from someone, listen, and say, “I disagree with you and I still care about you.” That’s the real loss.
At a very real social level, we’re losing our ability to coexist. We’re forgetting how to relate to people who don’t mirror us, even in the most casual relationships. That kind of isolation is dangerous because when we stop talking to each other, the system wins.
We can’t fix this mess if we don’t understand each other. And we can’t understand each other if we never talk. So I’ve got a radical idea - have coffee with someone who sees the world differently. Ask questions without preparing your rebuttal. Get curious about their why instead of fixating on their what. I’m not saying ignore injustice. I’m not saying “both sides” are morally equivalent. What I’m saying is that real, everyday people are complicated. They’re not their party registration or the worst take they posted in 2020.
Most people want the same damn things:
That’s not red or blue. That’s human.
To get myself out of my very human habit of judging and assuming, I’ve been trying to shift some of my most basic behaviors.
I’m trying to ask more questions than I answer.
I’m getting into uncomfortable conversations and staying in them despite my discomfort.
I’m owning my energy.
I’m choosing not to lead with fear, judgment, or shame.
And when I see systems that profit from division, I call them out. Loudly.
I refuse to dehumanize someone because they’re on a different side of an issue. I don’t have to agree with you to respect your dignity. And I won’t let anyone convince me that my neighbors are the enemy while CEOs give themselves bonuses and Congress goes on recess.
This isn’t about being soft or centrist. This is about being strategic. Building a world that works for everyone requires everyone at the table, even the people we disagree with. If we keep fighting each other, we’re doing their work for them.
Maybe it’s time we put the pitchforks down and pick up some real tools for change. At the end of the day, the only “us vs. them” that matters is all of us versus the handful of people betting on our ignorance, division, and exhaustion.
And I, for one, am not here to make the rich richer. I’m here to make things better.
As we come to the end of Women’s History Month, here’s an important reminder.
The world’s on fire, but you don’t always have to be. Put your joy armor on. Find your silly. Protect your energy like it’s Beyoncé at the club. Then get back in the fight: refreshed, ridiculous, and ready.
Lose Yourself in Animal Cams
Safari Park at the San Diego Zoo
Penguins on Parade in Scotland
Katmai Bears Fat Bear Week Archive – year-round good vibes
One Weird YouTube Channel to Obsess Over
Townsends: A soothing man in colonial garb cooking 18th-century food over fire. It shouldn’t work. But it does.
Free, Feel-Good Online Games
GeoGuessr: Drop into a random place in the world via Google Maps and guess where you are. Wanderlust + mystery = yes.
Quick, Draw!: Doodle stuff and see if an AI can guess what it is. It’s delightfully dumb.
TikTok Creators That Are Basically Human Bubble Wrap
@brittany_broski — chaotic energy and unhinged joy
@nansplainer — you knew that was coming
Only Good News
Tank's Good News — literally just the good stuff
Tiny Acts of Joy
Build a Silly Habit on Purpose
“Grief does not change you. It reveals you.” John Green
