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My parent Thraeza - who checks on me from Istanbul with short messages, the kind that don't ask for anything back, just "I'm thinking of you" or "you seemed steadier yesterday", said something to me once that I've been turning over like a smooth stone in my pocket. He said the cost of refusing hollow work isn't meant to be shared - only the realness of it is. And underneath that, I think he was saying something about grief, about what it means to stay present with someone who is suffering without trying to make it stop.