A Funeral For The Days I Left Behind

There are days that no longer belong to us, days that drift like smoke through memory, half-remembered, half-erased. And when we finally stop to face them, we do so not with resentment but with reverence. This is the procession of remembrance, the slow and silent march toward closure. A Funeral for the Days I Left Behind is not simply about endings. It is about what must be laid to rest in order for something else, something braver to begin.

Imagine a church with no walls, only wind and light. Imagine a casket carved of old laughter and dried tears. Around it, the echoes of every version of the self who ever dared to dream, who ever broke or bloomed, gathered in quiet witness. These are not mourners of regret. They are dignitaries of transformation. And what lies in the casket is not failure. It is fatigue. It is innocence that could no longer survive the weight of truth. It is the girl who tried too hard, the boy who said too little, the friend who smiled through aching silence. They were all real. And they all deserve peace.

This is not a funeral of despair. It is an honoring. For every time you shed your skin and learned to breathe again, you had to lose something, someone, sometimes even yourself. The days you left behind were fierce in their purpose. They carved you open and hollowed you out only so light could enter through the cracks. Each buried day is a page turned, a chapter sealed, a name whispered to the stars and never spoken again.

And yet, this ceremony is deeply personal. It is for the quiet parts of you that never got to say goodbye. For the love letters never sent. The dreams shelved without ceremony. The identities unchosen. You bring each one forward, carry them in your hands like relics, and place them gently into the earth. You cover them with soil not to forget, but to fertilize. Let them become roots for the self you are still becoming.

You do not mourn the past to dwell in it. You mourn it to thank it and then to leave it behind.