The beauty of sadness

I often wonder if it is ok to  feel sad.  If we are lucky, we spend a lot of our lives smiling and laughing and loving and being loved. But sometimes sad things happen and I find myself pretending they don't.  When people ask me how I am, I usually just say " fine, how are you?" I wonder what would happen if I said, "I'm feeling a little bit sad today, how about you?"
Yesterday I stood by and watched as one of my oldest and best friends stood in front of the coffin and said goodbye to her mum . She and her family were so strong and dignified in their grief that it made me realise that sadness, with all its pain, can be beautiful. Once the sense  of shock and loss and emptiness and grief  that inevitably comes with death has passed, there comes a gentler sadness that we will carry with us always. It is sadness that creates a hole in our heart that is the shape of the person we have lost.  It can never be filled by anyone else and it will never leave us but its very presence helps us move on.  It is a hole we can sometimes disappear into for a few moments, a sadness we can touch when we need to, just to make sure we haven't forgotten. A place where the memory of those we have loved and lost, will always be kept alive and safe.  So I think today, it will be ok to feel sad and when someone asks me how I am, I will try and be brave enough to say " I am feeling a little bit sad today. Do you sometimes have days like that?"

RIP Sheila.