it’s been easier to not deal with it, to just push it into the depth of a memory and let it suffocate from my task list at work, my paperwork to get ian’s caregivers switched to a new company, anything that doesn’t mean investing emotions. but now i’m faced with diving back in, pushing myself to remember the smells and sounds and textures of raw loss. as i retrace our lives and story to push forward on the manuscript, my heart is trying to get me to stop. my mind is only letting me go so far into the memory before pushing panic, and self preservation.
i can’t be afraid of what’s inside of me, what monster of grief sits in there. it’s more comfortable here on this side of it, the loss familiar and usual, though still unwelcome. but back there, back in the ICU and back in the bedroom that i shared with lydia and back in the mangled station wagon, the grief hasn’t aged. it’s new and it’s exposed. i can’t be afraid but it’s terrifying. i feel my thoughts lurch when they get too close, when they come too near to standing next to the hospital bed and brain surgery drainage tube.
please pray for me, for us, that somehow god would make these hands move on the keyboard and words form in my mind to tell this story at even a fraction of the weight that it’s worth.
Very messy roads led us to and from Christmas as we ventured around the state.
Especially tonight, as we followed in a line of cars after too many miles of
making the first tracks like above, I was so comforted by the other travelers.
We were all just trying to get somewhere, and get there safely.
comfort of other drivers like comfort from others walking, running or crawling throughg life with us. That’s what we had this Christmas. Just time with our families.
we, like everyone, have been struck by the losses on Friday in the small Connecticut town. so much attention, chaos, media, theorizing. I’ve thought about those little babies killed a lot this weekend. but that’s what bothers me and that’s what the deepest sadness is for me as I watch this.
for now, the world is watching, and praying, and grieving alongside. but soon those other lives three states away will go on, as they should, unless they’re directly connected. and we will go back to work tomorrow and my sister who’s a teacher will go back to work tomorrow and my life will probably be the same as it was on friday at 9:00 am.
but for the moms and dads, especially them, this will never be out of mind or something that they forget. The sadness will chase them down every day. their minds will imagine and try to recreate and build a fake memory of being in that classroom with their baby and try to reach out and hold them. they will replay the day and how they could’ve altered it but eventually, some well-intentioned person will tell them that they should be doing better by now or say that at least they know their little one is in a better place.
that’s where the hollowness of death stings most.
in that loneliness.
in that life that won’t ever come back. when you’ve lost something that can’t be replaced.
and even with hope, hope for heaven and justice and an end to evil, the gaps and losses still breathe and grow. because you’re still there wishing it had never happened and wishing they were back. even the strongest in faith ache.
we finally had time to talk, after a busy few days. I admitted to Ian some temptations that I’ve been facing that, if grown, could affect him and our marriage.
“Tell me what I can do to help you,” he spoke, when my guts were spilled.
I questioned him on why that response, instead of surprise or frustration or concern. I asked why he didn’t turn it back onto himself, and how those temptations affect him.
“Because it’s a holy God that you’re up against.”
He gets it. So simply and clearly and beautifully. He turned my sin directly to the gospel and to how my sins are not primarily against Ian or our marriage but a holy God.
Stunned, because I had been carrying weight of the frustrations of my ugly heart, I looked at him in refreshed gratefulness. What a gift he is to me. He is a gift to my soul.
to help with our writing, this weekend we took a trip to one of Ian’s old hospitals. we were even able to go into his old room, since no patients were living in it.
grateful to leave it and see Ian sleeping at home.
tonight as i continued to read through old blog posts as i wrote, this caught my eye. it caught my eye because Steve and Mary were so involved in the planning on this room, the design of this room, the amount of sunlight for this room. our church built this room. Steve had talked that maybe one day it would be a space that ian and i could live in together, married. he talked about how we could maybe get a little kitchenette, and make it work.
our suite doesn’t have a kitchenette, but it does work. it’s become a place of respite as we write.
“Good morning. It’s Monday,” I greeted him as his eyes opened slowly.
“A new week.”
“Yep. What are your expectations?”
“I want to greet it with open arms,” he said.
So this man, waiting for someone to help him out of the bed and into the shower, will greet the week, openly and with thanksgiving. Much different than my own thoughts were and for him, I’m thankful.
mary and i recently read “The Devil in Pew Number Seven” separately and had a little bit of trouble putting it down. it attracted me in the book store because it didn’t look like the other Christian books surrounding it. i’ve also been looking for other memoirs to help me form my words and inspire our words and help build our story.
what happened in rebecca’s life is unreal.
the forgiveness she continually extends is unreal.
