Live, Love, Loss

Some friends of mine have suffered through some loss this week, which has prompted the following thoughts.

We spent many weekend afternoons with my Uncle Bill’s family. Sometimes we hiked Sleeping Giant*, sometimes we traipsed the neighborhood park, and sometimes we just hung out at one or the other’s home.  That weekend we were at my Uncle Bill’s home and after a lazy Sunday afternoon, we said our see you laters and I knew we would do it all over again the following week. Unfortunately, our next weekend together would be quite different.

A few days later, I arrived home after school to find my cousins at our house. My Uncle Bill, my mom said, had experienced chest pains and my aunt was meeting him at the hospital. I recall a blur of memories: a telephone ring, my mother stifling a cry, my aunt returning with the news that my uncle had died.

This cannot be, my mind objected, this simply cannot be.

But it was.

Death had assaulted our family already that year and it wasn’t even Easter.  Just the month before, my aunt from the other side of the family died, now here we were again.  My Uncle Bill died quite young and therefore left a relatively young family, my aunt of course and my two cousins who were barely 13 and 16. His youth only added to the tragedy of an already sad event. His death hit our family pretty hard. My sister shared an especially close relationship with my Uncle Bill and to my father he was more than a brother-in-law, he was a close friend.

Within the next couple of days, family and friends gathered at our home for the calling hours*.  Co-workers, church friends, and extended family meandered through every room offering their condolences.  I remember standing in the kitchen amid mountains of donated food not feeling the least bit hungry as the knot in my stomach hindered any thought of sustenance. But as my father sat at the head of the kitchen table, accompanied by my cousins, myself, and my brother and sister he began to encourage memories of my Uncle Bill. Remember when, he said and the memories flowed as well as the tears and even laughter accompanied our recollections. And slowly the knot in my stomach loosened up.

We live, we love, and we suffer loss. My father taught me an important lesson that day. There is no hiding from pain or grief because to do so we must hide from life as well. Neither can we banish or eradicate it for, as in the case of grief, we would have to eradicate every memory of the one we lost. Instead, let us cultivate healing by encouraging remembrances and sharing stories and allowing ourselves to remember when . . .

 . . . a righteous man will be remembered forever. ~Psalm 112:6

*Sleeping Giant is a state park in Hamden, CT

*Calling hours in our part of the country sometimes replaced what is known as the visitation or viewing at a funeral home.