I’ve never been someone who made a big deal about my birthdays. It’s not that I didn’t care I just never really needed the spotlight. To be honest it makes me uncomfortable. My 60th was different, though. My family surprised me, and John… he was so excited. He wanted to celebrate me. I remember how special it was to be surrounded by all the people we love. I remember how he looked at me, held my hand and said "Kath, you deserve to be celebrated. Don't be mad. " I wasn't mad, I was humbled by all the love. What a beautiful memory.

That was our last public birthday celebration. Neither of us were big into celebrating us, but our grandkids yes we loved that, I still do!

This year, I turn 64. The age he never got to reach.

John died just a few months before his 64th. And yes, I know the exact day I became older than him, April 22nd, my sister’s birthday. It came like a quiet wave, one of those moments when time feels both special and cruel. The days before this moment in time my body was tense and anxious. I never wanted this moment, it was never supposed to happen this way, was it?

This whole year has been an emotional rollercoaster. Grief is like that it doesn’t back off when it comes to milestones or celebrations. It shows up. It ebbs and flows, pulling us under one moment and letting us breathe the next. And in this season of becoming older than the man I loved most in this world, the tide has been especially strong. Some days I felt like I was drowning, or just treading water endlessly.

But here’s what I’ve come to know: You can hold sadness and gratitude in the same hands. You can ache for what’s missing and still feel joy for what’s here.

So this year, I’ve chosen to celebrate. Not me us. For the love we had, and the life I still get to live.

I’m throwing a party not because the grief is gone, but because love hasn’t left. Because I am still here. Because somewhere in the space between sorrow and celebration, there is room for laughter, memory, connection, and light.

I celebrate the people who’ve walked with me in this strange new life, and the stories that have found mine. I honour the friendships, old and new that have reminded me that healing doesn’t mean forgetting. It means carrying love forward and its ongoing just like my grief.

So here’s to 64 for me, for John, and for every single person who grieves and loves and still wakes up choosing to embrace whatever life has in store even when it feels impossible. I celebrate your journey, your grief and your love.

Here’s to living as you are, where you are, without a filter, just being you.

That is enough. That is everything.

I see you my grieving friend. I say this because we have all lost someone, something or some place we love and with that comes grief. Grief is our last expression of love.

Life Within Loss - a poem by Kathie Powell

I carry your memory, not as a weight holding me down,

but as wind that moves me forward.

I laugh, and it echoes through the ache.

I cry, and still the sun rises.

Celebration isn’t forgetting

it’s remembering with open hands.

It’s dancing with the empty chair,

and lighting candles for what was

and what still is.

Grief lives here,

but so does love.

And life

even now

even still

blooming beside the broken hearted.

Love,

Kath