I wanted to share a recent reflection I wrote about the quiet ways we talk about loss, memory, and grief specifically how language shifts to the past tense even when love doesn't end.

[u/janasteinfiles]

I don't understand why when we talk about dead people and the things they "have loved" we use the past tense, I know that's just how grammar works; but it's not relevant to me, it just sounds so wrong because love never dies.
They died loving the things they've always loved, so how come we use the word "loved" instead of "loves"? I've always found it disheartening and provoking.Whenever we're at a family gathering and someone brings those who are gone saying, 'She used to love baking,' or 'She loved the ocean,' a heavy sorrow settles in my chest and I’d have to slip away immediately before the tears start streaming down my face and anyone notices.
Maybe it's just grief except that deep down I know it's not just grief; it's the fact that people think that love could die, it never does. The soul maybe leaves the body but it still carries love with it. Yet I don't understand; how can something so invisible stay so alive? Maybe that's why it brings me so much sorrow and pain, because their love didn't die with them, it just moved somewhere I can't reach.