The Ending Tide
There is a tide that comes with every ending.
Not the crashing kind that tears at the shore or leaves wreckage scattered in its wake. Those waves come earlier. Those are the waves of loss, of fear, of questions with no answers. They rise without warning and knock us from our feet. We swallow saltwater and wonder if we’ll ever breathe normally again.
Grief has a rhythm all its own.
At first it comes relentlessly, wave after wave, leaving no time to recover before the next one arrives. The smallest memory can become an undertow. A familiar song. An empty chair. A birthday. A scent carried on the wind.
You don’t forget.
You simply learn how to stand.
One day you notice the waves no longer reach quite as far. They still arrive, but they don’t carry the same force. The tide has begun to turn.
Not because your love grew smaller.
Not because the memories faded.
But because healing quietly began its work while you weren’t looking.
The ending tide doesn’t erase the ocean. It simply reminds you that even the strongest waves cannot stay at their highest forever.
Maybe that’s true of life itself.
We spend so much of our days fighting the current—trying to hold on to youth, to certainty, to people we love, to moments we wish would never end. We fear the tide because we believe every retreat is another loss.
But what if we’ve misunderstood it?
What if the ending tide isn’t our enemy?
What if it is mercy?
Perhaps the final tide isn’t one that sweeps us away in darkness.
Perhaps it is the gentle pull that carries us home.
No more striving.
No more pain.
No more wondering if we’ll make it.
Only the quiet movement of the water, the warmth of the light beyond the horizon, and the familiar voice we’ve trusted all along calling our name.
Maybe that’s why the sea has always whispered to us.
Every tide is a reminder that endings are woven into creation—not as punishments, but as promises that nothing remains broken forever.
One day my own tide will come.
I hope I don’t meet it with fear.
I hope I recognize it for what it has been all along…
Not the end of the story,
but the tide that finally carries me home.
The Quiet Path 