Lately, I find myself confronting emotional depths that I had conveniently neglected with the passing years of adulthood. It’s so much easier to face the world without letting yourself get torn apart by it; after all, this planet offers much that can disappoint and even threaten to destroy us, leave tears on our faces and anguish in our hearts. The proper path of maturity often dictates that we find a drawer in which to place these emotions, or extinguish them altogether, and I’ve bought into that practice. It’s easier than feeling things deeply. But pregnancy did a number on me, followed by yesterday’s tenth anniversary, and sometimes the waves of emotion have to roll unchecked with the pulling together and gathering up left for their aftermath.

Ten years. A decade. I watched the television, like most of you, as the images of that day unfurled on screen, and thought I don’t want to degrade the experience of those who lost nearly everything by going into detail about how it affected me on my couch hundreds of miles away, I will say that John Donne’s words never proved truer. And when I became a New Yorker four years later, I was integrated into something larger than myself, something stronger than hate and destruction, something resilient and hopeful beyond despair, a fighting spirit born of what felt very much like faith. Now I’m settled back into a spot hundreds of miles away, feeling the disconnect that geography brings but also the kinship that it can’t erase, and as the State Farm commercial and Paul Simon’s solo appeared onscreen, the wounds of that day felt fresher than ever; sadness and rage rose up within me and left me close to despair, and I couldn’t help but be surprised and unnerved: ten years gone by. Years of healing, and I didn’t even lose a loved one in the disaster, yet there is a depth of anguish that is completely unresolved.

Apparently, I am expanding in more directions than I thought. I watched a profile on the FDNY Ten House, standing next to Ground Zero, the men of that unit who were lost and the tourists who have appeared there every day since to thank the remaining firefighters. I heard their deep gratitude for these expressions of appreciation, coupled with the acknowledgement that each visit is a reminder of the loss, that there is no respite from the pain they carry.

I think about it on a smaller scale, how each of us individually is weighed down by what we choose to carry–how some of it is unnecessary burden and some of it is meant to make us stronger, make us who we are meant to be. I think about the doctor’s order that I not carry heavy loads and TH’s immediate responses: picking shaded parking spots, not letting me help with the groceries. Then, the load I can’t and wouldn’t stop carrying, the one I am now understanding will only grow once it moves outside my body and takes on more meaning: a life inextricably bound to mine and TH’s as we are tied together by the cords of family, a three-fold unit steeped in a new kind of love that inconveniences me out of my self-absorption and into the emotional upheaval that characterizes sacrifice. Sacrifice never has a day off.

In my life, I’ve been taught through difficulty and grace to let go of loads I’m not meant to bear; namely, that illusion of control, the letting go of which at first feels like falling apart but turns out to be a rebuilding through redemption. And I’ve watched the world’s brokenness invade the bonds of love and leave loss behind. Letting go can be freeing or it can feel like death, depending on what we’re charged to give up. Yesterday, I  reveled in The Niece’s laughter as I lifted her in the air; I watched fatherhood take shape in TH as he put The Nephews to bed. I witnessed growth and deepening on a day that will always mark sadness and devastation. And I realized that this is the world in which we live; the love and loss migrating side by side as we walk forward. We can escape neither, and the feelings are not meant to be resolved after ten years or a hundred, because hate is not meant to go unchecked, unanswered, or unmatched by love. Injustice is meant to be swallowed up by ultimate justice, which will not be delivered this side of eternity. So I let the tears flow unguarded and make me more human; I let the nudges from within bring me to life like I never knew life before. I watch from hundreds of miles away as water flows unchecked into the footprints of what was–scars that can only be answered by sacrifice, by what remains standing, and by the depth of wounds that bear my name and carry me.