What We Carry
On one hand, it feels like a lifetime ago. On the other hand, it feels like just yesterday.
Before that day, I don’t think I truly understood what it meant to feel the pain of people I had never met.
But ever since that day, I haven’t been able to forget.
They went to celebrate life, never knowing theirs was about to end.
That thought still hurts.
We all carry the pain differently. For some, it was a brother or sister. For others, a friend. A parent. A child.
And for many of us, they were strangers.
But they didn’t stay strangers.
Their faces became familiar. We learned their names. We learned their stories. We learned who they were and what they stood for.
1,219 people.
People with plans for the next morning. People with families waiting for them. People who lived life to the fullest.
People who thought they had more time.
I think that’s the part that gets me the most.
As I took my morning walk today, I passed so many strangers. People walking their dogs, heading to work, going for a run.
And I couldn’t help but wonder what each person is carrying with them from Oct. 7.
For some, today marks the anniversary of losing someone they loved.
For others, it means remembering someone they never even knew.
And for some, maybe it means simply trying to go about a normal day while knowing that this date will never feel normal again.
Because life did keep going.
Somehow, we learned how to move through ordinary days while carrying something that was anything but ordinary.
We kept living.
But I don’t think any of us went back to being exactly who we were before.
Three years ago, Oct. 7 was just another date on the calendar.
Now, it’s a date embedded in our hearts.
It’s 1,219 people who woke up that morning not knowing it would be their last.
It’s families who woke up the next morning and had to figure out how to live without them.
And it’s an entire country that learned the names and faces of people who were once strangers.
Three years later, I still think about them.
People I never met.
People I somehow feel like I know.
People I will never forget.
Oct. 7 will never just be another day on the calendar.
We will carry it with us forever.
May their memories forever be a blessing.
