A little story. Perhaps you've heard it before.

A man loses something he cares about deeply, profoundly.

A woman loses something she cherishes beyond measure.

Something precious is gone. It ended quietly, gently, like the last exhale in a deep night.

Or, it was stolen, with violation and violence and knives and terror.

Something good + golden + exquisite + dear + sacred ends. Once there, now gone.

Do you know this story?

Yesterday, Valentine's Day. When we free associate, we quickly come to the heart.

Inside the heart? Beautiful rooms of relationships, joy, connection.

There is another room, though. Less visited, less celebrated, the room is locked or ignored or suppressed. We don't really talk about it, individually or culturally.

That's the room with heartache.

That's the room of grief.

‍

Three years ago, we launched Food as a Verb to tell stories that feed people.

Don't think we ever said the word "grief" out loud once. Never said: let's tell stories about grief or grieving.

(That's a hell of a business model.)

But looking over our shoulders, it's been there the whole time. Do you see it, hidden in the corner of the stories? Hidden in plain sight?

Loss. Change. Death. The ongoing goodbye.

‍

The seeds that fall to the ground.

‍

The last trot around the field.

‍

The stones that cannot be moved.

‍

The unbearable burden of hunger and want.

‍

The fear and finality of death.

‍

All of this is played out within food and the table.

‍

There is always a last bite. The meal always ends.

‍

And the sun always sets.

‍

These words aren't written out of despair, but rather, a hunch.

My hunch? There's a lot of grief being carried in the world today. Individually, collectively, quietly, painfully.

And we don't really talk about it.

And not doing so is eating us alive.

"Grief is the doorway to change," one friend said earlier this week.

I've been grieving for a long, long time, but it was something about her words that sparked a thin light inside. So, I wondered:

What if we had dinner together and talked about grief?

This Thursday, upstairs at Calliope's private dining room, I'm inviting you to a special dinner where — with stories, poems, laughter, questions, discussions — we'll begin to open that doorway on grief.

Just a nudge. Just a crack. Nothing more.

I'm calling it Skeletons Dinner. There's something in our closets that's wanting to breathe. Let's begin to talk about unlocking the door.

Earlier this week, all members of The Table got an early invite with discounted tickets. (See here.) Want to join? (See here.)

It's a minimum cover charge for my expenses. Then, Calliope servers will offer a full menu: eat and drink as much as you wish, with your own bill coming at the end.

A handful of tickets remain, but, if all goes well, we'll offer more Skeletons dinners in the future.

‍

I promise: the night will be, yes, fun. We'll laugh, cuss, drink alongside the heaviness. This isn't a funeral. (Not really a party, either.)

I'm an old teacher, with a few crazy tricks up my sleeve, and a collection of stories, poems and questions that will help, well, do something.

Let's talk to our skeletons. See what they say.

We know that grief is not the last word. A doorway to change. A vital part of life.

Yes, easy words to write, but how is it to live alongside grief ... as if it were a good friend? As if nothing was ... wrong?

"Nothing that feels bad is ever the last step," writes Eugene Gendlin.

There is something on the other side.

But what?

Story ideas, questions, feedback? Interested in partnering with us? Email: david@foodasaverb.com

This story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.

‍