The Opening

Katherine Mahon Holmes
May 20
3 min read

Updated: May 22

The large box of my memoir arrived yesterday.

I was on my way out to see a client when it was delivered.

And while this is the third attempt at the grand opening of my self-published book, this time I know the curtain is rising on the real thing.

The next morning, the box still sits on my coffee table, unopened.

Like a birthday present waiting for the real day.

Waiting until I can be fully present for what feels like the true first shipment. The one I can feel proud of. The one without the glaring error on the cover. The one with the spacing inside corrected. The one with the blue sky exactly as I wanted it.

That’s self-publishing for ya.

I’m not unhappy with my choice to self-publish. I’ve enjoyed (mostly) the journey. The creative process of learning something new. Of making mistakes and figuring things out. Of somehow wrapping six years of grief, love, loss, and healing into something that could eventually be wrapped up in a bow.

Very early this morning — hours before sunlight — unable to sleep, I came out to the living room with my phone and let YouTube play something soft enough to listen to and eventually fall asleep to.

Sometime later, I woke to hearing Sara Bareilles talking with Anderson Cooper about grief. She is so wise. She lives in a vulnerability that does not feel weak or small at all. It’s more like evidence of vulnerability’s strength.

I had to get up.

Make coffee.

Find a pen.

Find paper.

And write.

Because what she said about grief deeply moved me. It felt like the perfect way to introduce my own writing through grief.

She said:

“There was a time when I thought my grief would eat me. That I would dissolve in this unimaginable quality of pain.

And I think the learning for me is that you don’t dissolve.”

Then, in her humorous Sara Bareilles way, she added:

“Granted, I take medication. I do meditation. I have therapy. I have a lot of resources to help me.”

I appreciated her clarification because I needed help too—more than just writing.

Because grief is not tidy.

Some people do stay

deeply depressed.

Some people do not

move forward.

Some people die not long after

the person they love.

Then she said:

“I’m a mess a lot of the time, which I’m grateful for. I like my melancholy.”

Anderson responded:

“What a terrific word.”

I loved Sara’s response:

“It’s so delicious.”

My thought exactly.

She spoke of carrying melancholy with her in the world. Of feeling close to people’s ache and sadness.

“I find that really beautiful. And moving. And human. It’s why I write. It’s why I make music.”

Obviously, that resonated with me.

Then this:

“I wouldn’t want to be far from that feeling. But I don’t want to be in the fetal position all the time. Or not remember what it feels like to smile. I don’t want to be that person. That doesn’t feel true to me either.”

That resonated, too.

Because grief, for me, has never been about leaving it behind.

It has been about learning how to hold both ache and joy.

How to smile again without loving less.

Sara said:

“The learning from my grief is such a beautiful teacher. To draw it close to yourself is to draw yourself closer.”

And then this:

“The sharing of grief is essential. You actually won’t move through it alone. You must find the courage to share it. And I think you’ll be surprised how medicinal it is in a really good way…the sharing.”

This memoir — this vulnerable sharing — is my way of offering exactly that.

Not something weak.

Not something small.

But something essential.

And so, I give to you Me & My RV: A Widow’s Season of Grief.

Because I, too, learned sharing is essential.