Don't Despise the Meaningless Days

On grief, haircuts, and the strange beauty of ordinary life.

It’s a strange thing to mourn. It is often said that grief is love with nowhere to go. And yet, what do we do with that feeling? Do we run from it? Distract ourselves? Nobody really wants to grieve. Or do we lean into it, allow the feelings to come, and risk wallowing and ruminating on things that weigh our emotions down?

When Mum passed away, there was a sense of peace, of relief that her suffering was over. But with it, for me at least, this strange sense of not quite knowing what to do next. My siblings were given time off work for ‘compassionate leave’. But as a self-employed artist, what was I to do? It felt right to be compassionate to myself too. We spent time together just processing out loud. We shared stories and memories to make each other smile, reminding ourselves that it was a hard time and that, in many ways, it’s better this way. Better for her, but hard for us.

Centuries ago, people would take months for the mourning period. They would wear black and barely leave the house. These days, it almost seems normal to get straight back to work and keep moving forwards like nothing happened.

I tried to land somewhere in between. I knew I had to be kind to myself and let myself feel whatever was needed. It felt honouring of my Mum and a reflection of how much she meant to me to allow that time to remember. To let moments become memories. To let the sobering reality of being a man without parents sink in and remind myself that this is a significant new chapter in the story of my life. To un-form the habits that seemed so normal to me before: calling at her house every day, FaceTiming while I made dinner. It’s the small things in the day, those little interactions that are barely anything - those were the stories I liked to tell.

And this wasn’t the only loss I had to face - having recently lost a relationship too, I felt this absence more than maybe any other time in my life. I only had two people pinned to my list of favourite contacts, the ones I would be first to text and first to call, and I had to remove them both in the space of a week. These were the people I shared my life with, and not just the headlines but the meaningless moments. Yet, somehow, in sharing them they didn’t feel meaningless. They were bridges and threads that bound our lives together. Now I had to allow the time and space for these habits to be undone. To sit with the new reality.

But there were moments I felt like the time was also a waste. I felt the nagging pressure to perform, to have something to show for this time, to be productive. Occasionally I needed that distraction. I tried to go out and see my friends, I kept up some of my routines, I tried to make it to the gym and do some kind of physical movement. But some days just felt… numb. I remember standing in line at my local coffee shop and completely spacing out only to snap back to reality when it came to my turn and I was asked “what can I get for you today?”. It seemed such a trivial question that day. I ordered something - I don’t even remember what. I found myself replaying memories of the times I’d spent here with the people that were no longer around, and I sat trying to write in my notebook as I overheard conversations about the most ordinary things of life. A strange mix of frustration and comfort to realise that other people were just living their life as normal while I try to come to terms with these earth-shattering events.

I found myself repeating the same few lines to people when they offer their condolences. “Thank you”, “It was very peaceful in the end”, “She’s better off now”, “I’m doing ok”. Sentences that seemed to lose all meaning after a while. It was strange to sit down for a haircut and be asked by the barber, “so, how was your week?” - I felt I should reply with my usual lines and pass off the question as a mere formality but I found myself unexpectedly unburdening the last few weeks in a series of devastating headlines. I don’t think he was prepared for that answer, it got a little awkward and I realised I had probably overshared again. But he did say one thing that stuck with me. “You’re doing well to come for a haircut! It probably takes a lot to just leave the house at the moment”.

I didn’t realise until then that it probably was taking a lot of me to leave the house. A simple thing like getting a haircut, which felt so meaningless and routine in the past, somehow felt like a great achievement today. It struck me that it was actually ok to have days sat at home - to allow room for my feelings to come and go, to do what they need to do.

I think somewhere in that day I discovered that I was perhaps addicted to meaning. I don’t know if it’s my days in Christian youth conferences or my main-character syndrome, but I feel like every moment needs to be significant, full of purpose. I struggle with the meaningless days. I always feel the urgency and awareness that life is short and I don’t want to waste it. That each day should, in some way, push the story forward, make an impact.

And yet, in these weeks, I was learning to become ok with the slower pace. “Don’t despise the meaningless days”, I told myself one morning. I think I had become so accustomed to drama, to major events happening, that I’d forgotten how to just be still. I realised it’s ok to have a day where I just do laundry, eat lunch and watch a show. In fact, that might be exactly what my soul and my body needs.

Even though these weeks and months have brought an unusual amount of grief, I think this idea is something I want to carry forward when the pain of losing people is a little further in the background of my mind. I want to be ok with having a boring day. I want to free myself from the performative need to show the world that I’m here, I’m doing things, I’m being productive, I’m doing something significant!

I wonder if the stories we read in the Bible of the dramatic events in the lives of believers were actually just short moments of drama in an otherwise ordinary kind of life? That’s one thing I admired about my parents’ faith. It was so ordinary. My dad would wake up and read the Bible every morning, Mum would sing worship songs as she hung washing outside. And yet, meaning and significance effortlessly flowed from their seemingly ‘meaningless’ and ‘insignificant’ moments. A year or so after Dad passed away my Mum told me that she found purpose in going out and brightening people’s day. Just smiling or making eye-contact on the bus, offering a helping hand or a compliment.

If anything, grief has shown me that simply to be alive is meaningful. To be here in this moment, to journey through the ups and downs of life and still carry some love and kindness in your heart - that is significant.