Are there two words in the English language as unlikely to be paired as “grief” and “nachos”?

Doubtful. But I’m nothing if not unusual, so why should this blog be any different?

The terms collided for the first time on August 27, 2018. The occasion?

The visitation on the night before my mother’s funeral. After hours of greeting no fewer than two hundred visitors (and that’s a conservative estimate), the only people left in the funeral home parlor were a few family members, myself, and my two longtime best friends. It was late, they had traveled a good distance to see me, and we were all hungry.

And my favorite Mexican food place was across the street.

And because I have an insatiable need to be laughed at, and because I share my mother’s flair for the loud and inappropriate comment, I announced to my friends and those around us that we were off to dinner. “We’re going to get grief nachos!”

Everybody laughed, because 1)I’m hilarious; 2)you don’t not laugh at the joke made by someone who’s about to bury her mom; and 3)presumably, the subtext was clear: obviously, nachos – even better, Costa Vida’s magnificent sweet pork nachos – are calorie-free when consumed by and/or in the company of someone who’s grieving.

Before I go on: there’s so much to say about Mom, so don’t let the brief treatment she’ll get in this post deceive you: she was the toughest person I’ll ever know. She loved her children and grandchildren fiercely. She was smart as a whip, called-it-like-she-saw-it, and did not suffer fools gladly. She loved the Lord her God with all her heart, all her soul, and all her mind, and all her strength yet she wasn’t “precious” in that June Cleaver kind of way. She was like no one else. She was my mom… my only mom…

And she’s gone. It’s been almost nine months, and I’m heartbroken. I’m carrying on, because she would NOT have any pity parties or weeping, thankyouverymuch, but I miss her constantly.

But anyway – the nachos.

My two best friends had made a cross-county trip to join me on this night, and in the flurry of visitors, I wasn’t able to really talk to them, so we made a dinner date. We ate, we talked, we cried… and it was the beginning of my grieving process. Mom had died several days earlier, but in the flurry of funeral-planning, I was on auto-pilot. I stayed that way for a few days and weeks* afterwards, to be honest.

*Okay. Fine. Months.

I stayed busy for days following the service, saying goodbyes to visiting relatives, tying up odds and ends with the funeral home, etc. About a week after the fateful meal is when inspiration struck. If you live near me, I could show you the actual spot on Hall Johnson Road where I felt God lay it on my heart. I’ve learned so much through Mom’s death. Practical matters. Spiritual truths. Emotional lessons. Maybe I’m meant to share it with others.

A blog! I can call it Grief Nachos.

And, fair reader, here we are.

I bought the domain name three months ago. It’s taken me two months to fill out content here and there. I have drafts of ideas and posts, but I’ve held off, afraid of not saying the right thing, or saying it the right way.

But in the past couple of weeks, the Lord has shown me time and time again the reality: so many of us are grieving. We’ve lost loved ones after long, agonizing fights with illnesses. We’ve lost loved ones without warning, and are now bereft. We’re watching our children struggle with disabilities and disadvantages, and we’re in agony in our powerlessness to help them. We learn the stories of people we see every day – people hiding battles more difficult than we could ever imagine, toiling alone in the darkness while an oblivious world carries on around them.

And guys… it’s just too damn much for my heart to hold.

We all encounter death, disappointment, and disillusion. But the worst thing we can do is allow ourselves to suffer alone.

I have no idea what this blog will become. It may not amount to anything more than an occasional escape for an unfulfilled stay-at-home mom. But I have high hopes that it might grow into a place where many can come together. Where broken hearts can break bread, laugh a little, cry a little more, and find our way out of the darkness and into the light.

So here I go. I’ll endeavor to create a place where we can share. Let’s pretend there are nachos, and let’s sit around a figurative table, sharing our woes. Let’s remember that if we are grieving at all, it means there was a person, a wish, a dream, an opportunity so wonderful and lovely that to have had it at all was a gift to celebrate, even as we agonize over its loss.

Welcome to Grief Nachos.