When a Black woman travels while grieving

Grief is a monster, an unsuspecting one. When the storm of grief rumbles and settles over your life, generally there is an expectation of sadness. There is something, someone or somewhere that you have lost. While it was still an active, tangible presence for you, you projected things upon this person, place or thing: your understanding of who you are as a person, your dreams, your hopes, your laughter, your joy, your trust. With loss, you’re left with these concepts hanging in the balance. There’s a reordering of self that has to happen—along with how consuming grieving is.

But my Dad’s birthday was upcoming, the first one since his death. I knew from my previous grief history that birthdays of those who have died can be surprisingly painful. There’s a marking of time with birthdays; they represent another year of life, another loop around the sun. And with grief, it is another year they have not grown older, another year that new memories are not made, another year of not having to remember to call or send a present in the mail. I looked to travel—and booked a flight to Milan and a train to and from Florence where I had never been for a week. Because not only did I have my Dad’s birthday to get through, I had the birthday of my best friend who died in 2017.

Traveling to assuage the wounds and many tears of grief is not a new practice for me. Years after my friend’s death, I wrote a piece for Well + Good about griefcations, as in travel dedicated specifically for mourning and remembering those who have gone on. This can be helpful during those sticky anniversary dates: their birthday, the date of their death and other dates of importance and resonance. I looked to Florence with fervor and faith, hoping I could take a reprieve from all the sadness of pondering what I could be if my Dad was still alive. Who I could’ve been without the weight of loss of the anchor in my life to understanding of myself and the world that my Dad represented.

My first night, I stayed in Milan, revisiting a hotel I’d stayed in decades ago when I was another version of myself. That evening, I dressed and put on makeup, pretending I was going to a birthday dinner with my late best friend. It was, after all, her birthday. I enjoyed the meal without too many tears and wondered what we would’ve talked about if she sat across from me. Her partner that I knew who has since moved on? The child she told me she was ready to have before her death that would’ve been five or six years old now? 

The next morning, earlier than I wanted, I arose and took a train to Florence. I bought a first class ticket that came with free wine and snacks. I wrote and thought about absolutely nothing as the landscape whizzed by. Florence was beautiful. And I have never been more morose on a trip in my life.

When I returned home from my trip, I told my then therapist that I felt a sense of disappointment that I had flown thousands of miles to spend most of my time sleeping in my Airbnb. I couldn’t understand what the point of this trip had been—I could’ve stayed home to sleep and barely experience where I was. As a traveler, we are ingratiated with this idea of being somewhere meaning we need to do, do, do and see, see, see. She reminded me that maybe I needed to rest far away from home. Maybe I needed to sleep in a new environment. Maybe I needed a temporary jolt to my soul. 

And when I think about some of the moments I had—walking past throngs of people and stores flesh with Italian gold, the whiff of Italian leather from stores lining the street, watching gelato shop workers scoop ice cream for customers, scouting for lasagna multiple times, sipping a nasty ass negroni in a back alley as I looked up at the night sky—I knew she was right. I wanted to feel alive instead of a deadened, dull version of myself. To be reminded of the beauty of this big, wide, busy world. Even as I was crying and saddened and grieving. Travel gave me glimmers to go on. 

Grief is a monster. A force. An unavoidable, inevitable part of life. Time and time again, I’ve looked to travel as a reprieve, an enlivener. Doing so while grieving, existing in this world where so many I have loved no longer do is no different. It is a space of joy, where I can imagine that life will be bright and full again, even while being submerged in the gloom and horror of grieving.