I've been thinking a lot about loss lately.
I think it started with Haiti.
I think it continued as I was listening to someone I care about lament a bathroom remodeling project over the phone while I was watching coverage of mass grave burials in Haiti. They were using skip loaders to move the bodies.
The juxtaposition between my current life (problems/complaints/desires/status) and theirs in Haiti struck me, and has stayed with me.
I think it continued when our copy of Newsweek came in the mail and I saw a picture of a very young girl in a pile of bodies outside a morgue in Haiti awaiting burial. She was just one of many people. But she was young, and I have a young daughter, and I cannot imagine. I just cannot imagine.
I think it continued this afternoon when I came across a blog of a mother who gave birth to a premature and stillborn daughter on January 8, just a few short weeks ago. Her Christmas blogs were all about babies and hope and anticipation. Her most recent ones are heart-wrenchingly honest. Brutal to read. And I cannot imagine.
Well, maybe I can imagine.
And I think it continues as I mull over the possibility of what I would do "if."
My God, my God, do not let it ever be.
But it was for my mother.
And for me. And us, her children.
We are -- I am -- so sheltered in our world of plenty. Our insulated world of plenty and goodness and prosperity and even excess. But bad things still happen to good people, and while it is difficult and painful and unthinkable and harsh, I'm not sure it's entirely morbid or even unproductive to think about what I would do.
If.
I think I would feel like I could never survive it. Having been through it once I don't think I could do it again. I think I would never be able to raise my head off my pillow again, that my heart would never heal, that my world would shatter beyond repair.
But I know that time heals. I know that He brings peace. I know that all things -- even unimaginable, horrific things -- are temporary and can be overcome. Still my heart is full and my old scars ache for those who are experiencing these things fresh and real and oh-so-overwhelmingly today.
So I pray.
2 comments:
Sometimes I let myself imagine a "what if." For a brief moment I will feel excruciating pain, and then I sniff away the tears, so grateful that we are safe.
I wish no one ever had to lose a child and that no child ever had to lose a parent. It's just too awful.
I am moved by what you have said. I feel it too.
Like Lisa I let myself "what if" for a centering excercise fairly often too. It can really make you appreciate what you have.
I think the most powerful prayer has always been "thank you" sent directly from the honest place deep in the heart. I try to say thank you everyday for the beautiful and privlidged life I have RIGHT NOW, and realizing it is a fragile and rare thing indeed.
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