Hi. Welcome.

I’m Shannon (that’s me on the left). I decided to create this space as a place to put down my thoughts and feelings as a widow, as a grieving human during a pandemic. My husband, Daryl (that’s him on the right), died of colon cancer in 2020. Then, my mom died suddenly in January of 2022. The grief journey I have been on since that time (and, honestly, well before he died) has been wild, winding, soul crushing and life affirming. Hence the name of this site. It’s a play on the title of Ernest Hemingway’s memoir, “A Moveable Feast,” which, I recently learned was a play on the term for a holy day. Here’s why I chose it: I’ve found that grief is always moving: Away, toward, around, in and out of you. It’s never really in the same place twice and neither is the griever. It will come for you—conveniently, alone at night in your bed, or, inconveniently, in the middle of a supermarket aisle when you spot a favorite item of your person.

Something we don’t talk about much when we are also avoiding talking about grief, is how life is still goes on. That there is life in grief and around it, and sometimes it feels like both things are together, and other times they are completely separate.

I meant to launch this earlier, alas, procrastination, indecision, total days of blankness have been part of this journey, too.

Plus, I struggled with the idea of why I am even doing this and I’ve sort of halfway landed on it being a space to come to where I can pull myself out of the fog, share articles, essays, thoughts and ideas that hopefully will help you, too. My goal is to post at least a couple of times a week.

I’m not a professional, I have no medical background, I’m not an expert in psychology. All I know is grief is an absolute mofo and if there’s any way I can share my experience (highs, lows, lots of in-betweens) and help you feel less alone, then that’s good enough.

Lines from the poem “Wild Geese” by the incredible Mary Oliver have resonated with me very much this year:

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Life feels like it is on two parallel tracks, there was a crossroads when Daryl died and now my train is on a whole different trajectory. It’s a before and an after, but it’s also both/and. Confusing and weird. Maybe you feel this way too, maybe you don’t, maybe you will one day and you will come back to this space and find a soft landing.