For Getting
We have forgotten
how to remember
When I recall the windy evening at the beach
With her snuggled in my lap, my arms around her body
Do I only recollect the images saved on my phone of those moment?
Our family standing with our back to the gaping mouth of the Grand Canyon
What rushes to my mind is not a memory because I’m seeing myself
Tan and smiling
And my memory of the moment
Is crowded out by the memory of the album “family trip” in my photos
We remember moments experienced through a small black box
and we watch the screen as we watch for moments
to capture the scene
freeze the feelings
select the sense of being alive
Do we believe if we don’t capture the moment
It didn’t exist?
We mistakenly believe the moments are for “got”
”I got them.”
And we don’t remember the moments are for “getting”
Experiencing as they come
Letting them go
Remembering the moment not as they are
But as we are
About the author
I'm Morgan Motsinger. I hold a BS in Psychology with a minor in Neuroscience from Portland State University, and I host P.S. We Expire, a podcast about grief, death, and what it takes to live well anyway. I also spent fourteen years caring for my daughter Anni, who died in 2022 (MPSIIIa). I write about grief from both sides of that — what the research says, and what it's actually like inside. Nothing here is medical advice, and I'm not a clinician. It's the explanation I wish someone had handed me.