This is the inside padding of Chester’s bed that has been sitting in my laundry room for five months.

And this is Chester.

I have to use the past tense now when speaking about Chester, and I find that to be just another assault on my heart. Going from “is” to “was” is inescapably cruel.

Chester died in June, after living a very healthy and well-loved life for nearly fourteen years. I know you think you have or had the best dog, (again with the past tense,) but Chester was a one in a billion boy.

We spoil dogs in our household. You could give us a champion bloodline, highly trained dog, and within a couple weeks, we will have him barking at us when he wants a treat and giving us four inches of the sofa so he can spread out. It’s what we do, what we are known for – we completely ruin dogs until they are in charge of us.

Chester wasn’t having any of that. He was perfectly behaved the first day we brought him home from the rescue, and he remained perfect all the days of his life, despite our best efforts.

So, what do you do with the bed of a perfect dog? I can’t bear to look at it, because it makes me so sad, and I can’t bear to give it away.

I was talking with one of my neighbors yesterday. She has had three deaths in the last three years –her 56-year-old brother, 31-year-old son-in-law and then her mother. We spoke about the holidays and their superpower to inflict pain when you are grieving.  They aren’t something you enjoy; they are days you endure.

There is the push-pull of grief. How can you celebrate Thanksgiving? How can you not celebrate Thanksgiving? How can you have a merry Christmas or Happy Hanukah? How can you not do anything on those days? Not doing something feels wrong. Doing anything feels wrong.

I knew this amazing woman, Margaret Anderson, also known as “Mugs.” She was 82 years old, and we would meet for lunch when I was in my early thirties. One day I asked her, “how do you do it? How are you so vibrant and fun when you are 82, when so many people seem to be settling in and not doing anything new at your age?” I loved her answer. She said, “Oh Mary, those people were like that in their thirties too.”

Mrs. Anderson, as I called her, was very close to her niece. Her niece was newly married, and her husband had died suddenly. Mrs. Anderson suggested she come up to her house for Christmas and spend it with her, just the two of them. After the holidays had passed, I asked Mrs. Anderson what they did on Christmas day. She said, “We woke up early, drank lots of champagne, toasting our deceased husbands, cried over the sadness of our losses, gave each other a nice gift and then slept the rest of the day.”

I am keeping that in my back pocket as a survival tool for a tough holiday.

So, for now, Chester’s bed remains. I know one day, I will look at it, and it will just be a bed. I will understand the bed isn’t Chester and having the bed doesn’t bring Chester back, as much as I wish it could.

I know there are many out there like my neighbor I met yesterday. I know December 1^st can usher in a world of hurt, following up on the tsunami of Thanksgiving pain. I wish I had some pithy thing to say right now, like, “what you need to do is…” As though there is any one thing that could lift the pain.

The one thing I will offer is to honor it. Honor your broken heart and your wounded emotions the way you would honor someone who was in a body cast. Take a bath or don’t take a bath. Eat or don’t eat. Drink or don’t drink. Your gut, your intuition is so raw when you are feeling deep sadness. You really have to let it be in charge.

It can be disastrous when you don’t. I tried putting a happy face on one really sad Christmas. The Capital Grille employees who were working that Christmas Eve might still be talking about the lady who just lost it, even before the entrees were served.

Unexpressed tears seem to sit in buckets inside us, until they get so full and then tip over. That’s when you hear, “Clean up on aisle six,” and you are the person they are trying to clean up. Crying really does let the sad out.

I’ll end with one of my favorite quotes about grief. It is from one of my favorite authors, Glennon Doyle:

“Grief is love’s souvenir. It’s our proof that we once loved. Grief is the receipt we wave in the air that says to the world: Look! Love was once mine. I love well. Here is my proof that I paid the price.”

Take care of yourself. Buy the expensive tissues.