When something new comes into my life that’s going to be around for a while, or maybe forever, I name it. My new knee, which I got two years ago, is Rhoda. My car is Loretta. I once had a computer I called Timmy.
Without thinking about what I was doing, I had named my grief, and her name is Wanda. I don’t know why her name is Wanda or why she’s a female, or why she wears a Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon T-shirt that has seen better days. It just is. And so I followed the prompt and wrote about Wanda. Given her ongoing presence, it seemed only fitting that I get to know her. The following is my written response to the prompt to personify my grief. I wrote it in March 2025 and found it in my files yesterday. I had forgotten about the essay, but not about Wanda. She’s been a constant.
“Ok, Wanda, show me what you’ve got.”
Without thinking about what I was doing, I had named my grief, and her name is Wanda. I don’t know why her name is Wanda or why she’s a female, or why she wears a Dark Side of the Moon T-shirt that has seen better days. It just is. And so I followed the prompt and wrote about Wanda. Given her ongoing presence, it seemed only fitting that I get to know her. The following essay is my written response to the prompt to personify my grief. I wrote it in March 2025 and reread it for the first time yesterday.
*****
Wanda has become a presence in my life, making her way into every spot where I live, rarely leaving me alone. Her entrance became the blanket I crawled under to take refuge from the world and myself, in a protective mode. Wanda is my grief. She arrived on January 4th, the day my daughter, Emery, died. She came without fanfare or invitation and hasn’t left. In the early days, she scared me and made me feel uncomfortable. I wanted her to leave, and when she didn’t, I wanted to know more about her. And so I asked.
She was seated across from me in the slip-covered chair, facing the small couch where I was seated, the same chair Emery always sat in when she was in this room. She stretched her legs out in front of her, crossed them at the ankle, looked at me, and, with a gentle, soft voice, said,
“I know you don’t want me to be here, but I am, because you need me. I will become less and less of a presence in your life as time moves on, but I’ll never leave completely. I’m here to teach you, darlin’, and you’re going to learn a lot from me. About life, death, love, and who you are now, who is not the same person you were before January 4th.”
“I’m going to learn from you?” I asked. I doubted that the skinny woman with day-old mascara smeared below her eyes and the dull, wrinkled skin of a smoker had anything to teach me. But before I could finish my thought, she added, “I will be the one to give you the roadmap to yourself, your new self, the self that is trying to navigate how you live your life without Emery, while keeping her close to you.”
There was a wisdom in her eyes that I wasn’t ready to accept, but I was curious. This presence, whom I’ve embodied as a skinny woman with sad, tired eyes named Wanda, came into my life on January 4th. She’s bigger than her small frame that is slumped in my chair. She’s all encompassing, and now I share my house, my feelings, my everything with her. I’m not sure where I end and she begins.
My morning routine is to write a letter to Emery. I’ve done this almost every day since her death. The pages consist of all the texts and phone calls that have no place to go. I have a small altar set up in Emery’s honor with photos of her and of us, along with small trinkets—stones, pink quartz, and a few heart-shaped rocks I found on the beach in Oregon. It is the first thing I look at in the early morning light as I sip my coffee and write my words to her. Wanda is always present for the ritual. Actually, Wanda is always present, but in the early morning, as I write through my tears, her presence feels stronger than at any other time.
I thought about the early days, when I shared an Airbnb in Boulder with my sons and their families for a month, as I was too afraid to be alone in my house. I thought about Wanda during those early days. I felt her presence. It never left me.
I continued our conversation.
“During those early days with my family, I longed for a break from you — a moment of returning to myself. A moment to feel joy, yet you never left. I felt you in the dark bedroom where I spent so much time sleeping. I needed a break from you, Wanda.”
“I did leave you alone during those early days. A few times. You just didn’t notice.”
“When?” I asked.
“One of the times was the night in that rental house when you, your sons, and your daughter-in-laws were all sitting in the room at the back of the house, playing Ransom Notes. Do you remember?”
I nodded.
“You were all laughing with the words you had come up with to answer the questions you had been given. At one point, you said, “It feels good to laugh. I wasn’t in the room. I had stepped out on the back porch to have a smoke. You felt joy, and you laughed, and it was necessary.”
My grief stepped out of the room for a smoke. Now we were getting somewhere.
I remembered the moment and how good it felt to laugh with my boys and daughter-in-laws. The laughter increased with each round. The one that made us laugh the most was when we had to write an ad for Viagra with the words we had drawn. There were tears in my eyes when we read our answers to each other, and the tears were different than the ones that had wetted my face off and on, every day since January 1, when our nightmare began and Emery was rushed to the hospital.
“Ok, you’re right, but why are you still here? I need a break from you, Wanda. You are the heavy cloak, I can’t shrug, and I’m so tired of carrying it.”
“I know you are, darlin’, but I’m here for a reason and a mission, and there’s not a lot I can do about it. Love sent me. You know we always work as a team, with love leading, and when she had nowhere to go, I took over. I wouldn’t be here if your love hadn’t been so deep, so present, so pure for your daughter. I know you’re going to have your own timeline and I can’t interfere with that, but I’ll tell you somethin’…the sooner you get used to me, the easier it will be for you, for us, because honey, I’m not goin’ anywhere. Maybe we could at least be friends, given that we’re already roommates.
Beneath her formidable, gritty presence was an emotion I hadn’t considered, yet she had told me multiple times. Love. Love sent her, and despite her tough-girl attitude, there was a softer, gentler side to her, which was her reason for coming in the first place. Love.
“You just tell me what you need and I’ll do what I can to help you.”
Wanda had moved from the chair to the other side of the couch when she saw my tears.
“I want you to go away,” I said, but counter to my words, I moved in closer to her and rested my head on her bony shoulder.
“ I can’t go away, but maybe if you can think of me as the place to put the love that you have for your girl. I can be that vessel for you. But I can’t leave, hon. It’s just how it works.”
I needed a place to put all the love, all the anguish, all of the pain, and Wanda, the most unsuspecting person I could have ever imagined, was offering me space.
The nights were the hardest, and although Wanda wasn’t always as present during the day, she knew the night shift was hers. I looked Wanda and, with hesitancy, said,
“I’m not going to be your friend, but your company is oddly starting to feel comforting. Maybe because love sent you and love doesn’t get it wrong.…”
Wanda interrupted before I could finish, “That’s a start, hon. We’ll go from there.”
I picked up a photo of Emery and me taken on a hike and smiled. I took in the memory first, knowing that the sadness would come later, but for now, I just smiled. I looked up and Wanda was gone. Probably out on my front porch having a smoke, but I knew she’d be back because she was following what love put into place and was the vessel to hold my loss.
A few minutes later, I opened up my computer to write and looked at my screensaver — a photo of Emery and me, with her babies, Arlo and Muna, seated in between us on my garden swing. It hit me harder than usual, even though it’s a photo I see every time I open my computer. I closed my computer and sobbed.
And there was Wanda, right next to me, her hand gently patting my back.
“I know, hon… I know.”