I looked in the mirror this morning and my face still looked like I had been crying non-stop, but really I haven’t cried a whole lot since the funeral. But it got me thinking about crying and how we deal with the pain and loss of someone we love. When my grandmother passed away back in October I don’t really remember crying much, if at all. It was a lot different though. She was 94 years old and while I don’t think she was actually in pain or suffering there at the end, I know she wasn’t living the kind of life she wanted. She hadn’t really left the house in years, she was physically dwindling away, and she had reached the point where she really couldn’t do anything for herself. I was obviously sad that she was gone, but I was also grateful that she wasn’t having to live with that deteriorated life. She was always so happy to see us, and she would talk to me and the kids the same as she always had, but I could see on her face that she just wasn’t doing great with this late stage of life. So I didn’t really cry; not because I wasn’t sad, but because I knew she was ready and this was better.

I’ve cried a lot less these past couple of days. Not because I’m not still sad…I am. I don’t think I actually have words, and I’m not sure there are even words, that can fully describe how sad all of us are. But it’s not so much sadness that I’m crying over since we laid him to rest. The tears have been from overwhelming pride and love that come from hearing stories about what a great friend and young man he was. They’re tears of gratitude for the outpouring of love and support from family and friends and even people I never knew but who knew my son and thought the world of him. I think there are always going to be some moments, for the rest of my life, when I’ll feel the depth of pain of losing him that I’ll break down and cry, but for now I’m not as much sad as I am just amazed at what an amazing young man he was, and what incredible friends he had. At the breadth of his impact on the world around him.

To some degree I feel bad, or at least a little weird, that I’m not so sad as I was a week ago. And in that same way, I felt guilty that I wasn’t crying more at my grandmother’s passing. I loved her so much; and she loved me fiercely! Heck, I was her favorite grandkid and she didn’t even try to hide it. Or at least that was always the joke. I know (and I hope, deep down, my brother knows) that she didn’t REALLY love me the most. She didn’t actually have a favorite grandkid, she just loved all of us in her own way that was unique to every grandkid. When we were little, I’d get off the bus in the afternoons and walk to my grandparents’ house to watch Jeopardy and play cards with Mamaw. She’d always have some food left over from lunch waiting for me on a plate. When they were in the fields I would walk to whatever field he was working in and ride in the tractor with Papaw until the end of the day. I’d ride in the grain truck with him to the elevator during harvest. I just had a different relationship with my grandparents. That didn’t mean Mamaw loved my brother any less than she loved me. She mourned and grieved when our cousin died in a wreck (18 years before Sean’s wreck, give or take a couple of weeks) and I know she was still saddened by that loss for the rest of her life. It was just different for each of us.

And we had always joked that Kaydee was my favorite kid. She’s my clone, both in looks and personality. While Sean looks more like his mother’s side of the family and had a much softer demeanor than I’ve ever had. But I know he didn’t really believe I have a favorite kid. He just needed to be loved in a different way. We would talk about it then hug it out after I was tough on him. I had more deep, hard conversations with him about life and why I was the way I was with him than I’ve had with anyone else on earth. I was hard on him because the world is a hard place; and God love him, he was a soft kid. I was trying to raise him to be a strong, good man. And he needed someone to press him, to push him, to expect and demand more of him. To get him to see his potential and understand that living up to that potential would mean having to toughen up and have a hard exterior at times.

These days since his death have shown me that he was all of that and more. He was striving to meet that potential. He was stronger for those who needed him than I ever could have imagined. He was so good to everyone. He had a toughness that made everyone around him feel safe and loved. And he did it all without having to become hardened. I spent most of his life trying to raise a good man. In death, he’s shown me that it’s possible to be all of that while still being soft and sweet, almost to a fault. For all the lessons it’s become apparent I was able to pass on to him, I think the biggest lesson is the one I’ve learned from him. That it’s ok to let that softness be something people know you for. And maybe, with a little work, I can soften up a bit too and become more like the man I raised, the man his world needed, than the one I thought he had to be.