August 5th 2013 will forever be a date engraved in my mind. It was three days before I was scheduled to pay a visit to my homeland of Haiti. It was also the day I received the most dreadful phone call to date informing me that my beloved grandmother had passed away.

After January 12th 2010, the day which saw Haiti crumble before my very eyes, the day that led to my abrupt coming to the United States, one would think I’d be used to expecting the unexpected. However, on that gloomy August night, I was taken aback by the fact that my grandmother had been taken from us just like that, only three days before I got to see her.

Countless thoughts ran across my mind, numerous questions only God could know the answers to. How was any of it fair? I was supposed to see her in just three days, why couldn’t it have waited? Tears flowed down my face as I sat down unable to grasp it all, refusing to believe that what was supposed to be a month of joy spent in my country would turn out to be one of grief and heartache.

As expected, the twenty days I spent in Haiti were nothing like I had planned before that phone call. When I landed on August 8th, all the anticipation and joy of getting to go back to the place I had spent the first eleven years of my life after three long years was replaced by sorrow and agony. When I got to my house the emptiness was felt immediately: my grandma was not and would never be there again. Not in her room, not sitting in the yard, not anywhere. I had spoken to her on the phone multiple times while in the States, but a phone call is nothing like actually getting to see someone face to face, feeling the warmth and comfort brought by their presence. Attending my grandmother’s funeral was by far the hardest thing I’ve had to do, as watching her still body and knowing that no matter what I said at that point she wouldn’t be able to hear me was devastating. But even in the midst of all the sadness, and even though I knew that there would never come a day when I’d forget about my grandmother, I wanted to find something, a piece of her to bring back with me.

“Take some of grandma’s rosaries back with you,” my mom told me in our native language. Sure enough, there was nothing better to fulfill that purpose than her rosaries. My grandmother was a deeply religious person and she instilled those values in all of us. She would never go a day without praying, and she would pray in moments of sadness and happiness alike. She didn’t leave much behind, but even if she did her rosaries would still be her most valuable possessions.

Being in the United States with my brother, away from our family being in Haiti has not been easy. Though no doubt a dreadful occurrence, I feel like my grandmother’s passing has played a key role in helping us stay united. We all carry a piece of her with us, and that reminds us to always remember to pray especially in times of hardship. Anytime I need to be comforted, I turn to my grandmother’s rosaries to lift up my spirits. Having gone through my share of adjustment periods since moving to New York, it’s nice to have them with me and have a sense of sameness amid so many changes. Simply holding them brings back many memories, whether it’s remembering those days I’d spend at her house as a child and having to sit there quietly because she would be saying her prayers, or later on when she moved in with my mom locking herself in her room and going through her daily prayer rituals every day at noon. My grandma’s rosaries might be the only objects that I have with me directly from Haiti and they may just be enough. They allow me to know that as time goes by, these memories that I very much cherish will never die.