Weeping may endure for the night

 ....but joy comes in the morning. Ps 30:5

I have a mug decorated with this psalm and an image of sunrise over farm fields by William Schickel, my friend's grandfather, that my mom gave me. It's one of my favorites because of the words, the image, the giver, the artist, the weight of the mug. Usually, it brings me a little joy in the morning as I lift the mug to my lips for those first, most delicious, bitter, enlivening sips of coffee.  

But lately, mornings are hard. 

After asking for prayers last week, I packed suitcases for me and for the nine year old as we were flying to San Diego to help our oldest daughter move to her first apartment. She didn't really have much to move, but I knew I wouldn't have time to visit when school started, and this weekend was open, so we booked cheap tickets for a flight Saturday to Wednesday. My daughter was thrilled we were coming. 

Then Saturday morning, as we were heading to the airport, I got news that the funeral for my friends' son, Sean, was going to be Tuesday.  My husband urged me to go. But then my daughter was visibly disappointed when I mentioned it after she picked me up.  Here I was with my living daughter. Should I book another flight to go to the funeral of my friend's son and leave her?

I lay awake that night debating and trying to work out various scenarios in my mind. Originally, I was thinking I would try to go to the visitation Monday and then fly back to Austin from Chicago.  But I also didn't want to desert my own daughter. On the other hand, my other college friend in Chicago, the godmother of the boy who died, encouraged me to come if I could make it. Finally, I decided not to go to the visitation, but to fly out Monday evening for the funeral Tuesday, and return Tuesday night for one more dinner and breakfast with my daughter. This also meant I could leave the nine year old in San Diego, and I would have all day Sunday and a half day Monday with my daughter. We stopped in a thrift shop for a black dress and shoes, and then we did some move in work and visited with San Diego friends, had a good dinner and a good breakfast and good coffee, and then oldest daughter dropped me off again at the airport. 

It all fell in to place, even though my flight was delayed five hours, and I arrived in Chicago at 3:30 in the morning, I ubered to my other friend's house and lay in the dark a few hours, trying again to sleep, and then got ready to go with my other friend. (These were the two college friends I met up with for our 50th birthday celebrations. And that day was actually this friend's birthday. She won't ever forget it.)

What can I say? It was a blessing to be at that funeral with hundreds and hundreds of others - family and friends, the high school and middle school cross country teams, the swim team, the teachers and faculty, families from the community, members of the church. This family had been at the school for nearly 20 years between their 4 kids, who all were baptized and confirmed at the same church. My friend's son was an altar server, a good student, an avid athlete, a friendly, cheerful, loving little brother. His parents both spoke. I don't know how. There wasn't a dry eye among the hundreds there. To start his homily, the young priest read from Sean's eighth grade religion essay, for which he won an award. "We do not need to fear suffering and death because in the end Jesus's cross always wins." 

Surely he is a saint in Heaven now, enjoying the company of other young saints whose families miss them immensely, even though they know they should rejoice. 

Just being at that Mass was worth the trip.  I knew I might not get a chance to really talk to my friend. Only immediate family was invited to the cemetary, but there was a luncheon afterwards for family and friends. I happened to be walking out of the bathroom at the luncheon when my friend walked in the door. We hugged and cried and cried. All I could say is "I love you."  That was enough.

We did get to visit a little more near the end of the luncheon, the three of us from our college group, plus my friend's husband who also was a classmate. We were a little group of college friends who had bonded while running track and cross country thirty years ago. We went to each other's weddings. We were pregnant together when we lived in Chicago for a few years - we had a shower for ourselves when I was pregnant with my fourth, the daughter I had just left, and my friends were each pregnant with their oldest children.  Years later they came to visit Coronado. We met for coffee or happy hour a few times when I had layovers in Chicago. Then there was a meet up at a Notre Dame football game, when we plotted to get together for our birthdays. Over the years, we have seen each other only a handful of times, exchanged Christmas cards, kept up on social media, but those connections made in college are strong. I am so, so grateful.

And so we wept again, talking about our babies. And I, who hardly ever sheds tears, cried again when I told my daughter and my mother and my husband about this beautiful, tragic funeral.  I don't know when joy will come again for my friend. Mornings are probably still full of weeping, as she wakes up, if she even sleeps, knowing her little boy won't be waking up. Her husband asked people to talk about Sean, to remember him, saying:  "Don't be afraid that saying his name will make someone sad. We're already sad. Instead it will bring us joy to know that others remember his spirit and that his memory is being kept alive."

May healing come, and maybe one day, joy.

Here is an article from their local paper: https://www.thehinsdalean.com/story/2023/07/27/news/funeral-mass-honors-life-of-14-year-old/6569.html

After the rain

 The morning of our friends' son's funeral was gray and rainy, the kind of perpetual, misty rain that lasts all day. The cool, damp air required rain jackets that muted the white and bright clothing that we were asked to wear. Because the funeral was for a small child who died in innocence, the Mass was a White Mass, a time for rejoicing, celebrating a new saint. I wore a light colored dress with a white cardigan; my husband wore his tan suit. Our daughters wore their school uniforms - they came from and returned to school after the Mass. My friend who had lost her little boy wore a long white dress and her girls wore their First Communion dresses; her other two boys wore white pants and shirts and little vests of the kind made for First Communions or late baptisms. 

And yet, despite the celebratory dress, it didn't really feel like a moment for celebrating. 

After the Mass we all drove sedately to the cemetery for one last goodbye. The cemetery was tucked out of the way on a tree lined plot coated with bluebonnets. Other graves were planted with roses already blooming and other budding plants, as well as assorted statuary and totems of loved ones. It seemed like a relatively new cemetery; more than one gravesite was freshly covered.  Both my husband and I were surprised they did not lower the tiny pine casket into the grave while everyone was present. All the mourners followed the parents in placing a hand or a flower on the casket and pausing for a brief prayer for the grieving family, asking for the new saint's intercession.

Then we all gathered for a reception at an historic home that now usually hosts wedding receptions. All eight of my friend's siblings and their families were in town, along with her husband's brothers and of course the grandparents, and lots of friends from the kids' school. The mood lifted a bit as a slide show played, and everyone ate. Cousins and classmates ran around. Mutual friends reconnected or met for the first time. The parents thanked everyone for coming.

After the Mass, the graveside service, and the reception, the family was going to go back home to sit with family, to change clothes, to clean up. Two days later the other kids went back to school. Time to return to the routine. Life continues. 

This is the prettiest time of year in Texas. The bluebonnets are coating the hills all along the highways, with splashes of prairie-fire (also known as Indian paintbrush) and pale pink evening primroses and occasionally sunshiny coreopsis contrasting with the blues. The redbuds just finished their purple blush, and now the fresh yellow green of new leaves are brightening the trees.  

The wildflowers announce renewal and new life and joys of beginning again, even when life is heavy. Next year the bluebonnets will return. Perhaps in remembrance we'll go back to the cemetery to say a prayer, or send bluebonnets to the family.  Today's gospel about Lazarus reminds us that Jesus wept because he loved his friends. Even if we believe in the resurrection, we, too, weep because we love our friends. And yet life goes on. I just finished reading Auden's "Musee des Beaux Arts" with my students - Icarus is drowning in a corner of the painting; war is waging as Auden stands in the museum, but the farmer keeps planting, travelers continue on their way, we go back to the work of surviving. 

Discomfort

 It occurs to me that perhaps I should title this post, "Beginning Again with Lent Pt 2."  I've taken a bit of a vacation from Lenten sacrifices. Last week was Spring Break, and amidst travel to New York and Boston and reuniting with family and friends, I have been very lax in practicing any sort of Lenten discipline, other than that travel is a discipline in itself in a way.

For instance, because of stormy weather over our final destination, home, on Thursday evening, the last leg of our travel, a flight from St. Louis to Austin, was cancelled. It was the last flight of the evening to that destination. We sat on the plane prepared to take off - in fact, we had taxied from the jet bridge - when the message came through that we had to wait. So we waited an hour on the plane before the flight was cancelled. Then, I had to wait in line to rebook a new flight. While I waited, I got on the phone to an agent and reserved a flight to San Antonio for the next evening, because all flights to Austin were full the next day. And I rented a car with the consideration that I could drive the 12 hours the next day and be home before this flight to San Antonio landed. Plus, I had the two girls with me, and the teenager is terrified by flying. With these reservations made, I stayed in line to see if I could get any vouchers. No vouchers were given because the cancellation was weather related, but the gate agent was able to book us on a flight that went first to Orlando and then to Austin that was leaving at 5:40 am - four hours later. 

When I conveyed this news to the girls, the teen started weeping because she didn't want to get on two more planes. However, I was calculating the time and cost of sticking with the rental car - shuttle or uber to a hotel at 1:30 in the morning, buy a few hours of sleep for a couple hundred dollars, find a ride back to the airport to pick up the rental, pay a couple hundred for the one way rental car, food and gas on the road, spend twelve hours of driving plus stops, returning the car the next day ... I hugged her and promised her that driving was more dangerous. 

Then we laid our coats on the ground and curled up on the airport floor to close our eyes for a few hundred minutes in supine position.  We might have slept an hour or two; it's hard to tell. 

The rest of the trip went as smoothly as can be expected, although a little turbulence made my daughter declare she never wanted to fly again. Our flights were packed with dozens of small children and their weary parents going to Disney World and returning from it. Their exhaustion confirmed my old decision to swear off Disney vacations - although we have enjoyed taking the kids to other amusement parks. 

Despite adding 12 hours to our trip and a terrible night of sleep, oddly enough I didn't mind the disruption. These are a part of the adventure of travel. In fact, I was slightly envious of the couple ahead of me in the line for the gate agent, even though they were taking their sweet time rebooking. The guy was a musician who was going to miss his gig in Austin, so they asked where could they go on a direct flight the next day that had a direct flight back to their home in New York on Sunday. They had a free ride to a 3 day vacation. I think they ended up going to Colorado or Oregon. What a liberating feeling to just go. 

Had this disruption happened at the beginning of our trip, we might have been more upset. And I have to say, the fewer people on the itinerary, the easier it is to deal with the discomfort. My two youngest are pretty mellow, other than the fear of flight. Sleeping on the floor wasn't a huge problem for them - or the lack of bathing. In fact, I had to make the youngest take a shower when we finally arrived home. She was ready to go play with her friend down the street in the same clothes she had had on for 2 days.  No big deal when you are 8. 

So did I think about offering it up? I actually did.  Just over a week ago, some dear friends, Navy friends whom we reconnected with here, lost their three year old son. He died in the early hours of the morning from complications from a virus. Perhaps because he had Downs, his little body couldn't fight it off. Their grief, and our own sorrow at his death, has sat heavily with me all week. And perhaps that is what helped make our own travel discomforts seem minimal.  Although I cannot know what the pain of losing a child is like firsthand, I have imagined it many times, have felt the fear of potential loss during a sickness or after an accident. What mother doesn't feel a sword pierce her heart occasionally? And yet, how we have been spared. How often potentials have never actualized.  Our little traumas are small compare to what others have suffered. 

So pray for them. Their son surely does not need prayers. They will have a White Mass next week - a mass of celebration because his heart was pure, and if anyone is in Heaven, it is children who died too young in their innocence.  This thought is a consolation, but it doesn't take away the pain of losing years together.  

Memento Mori

  

I was planning to sit down and write my traditional new year's reading wrap up and resolutions post this afternoon, but instead I'm going to share some memories of my uncle who just passed away very unexpectedly.  He had a massive heart attack while riding the exercise bike at his apartment complex.  The ladies in the office went in to check on him, and he was already gone.

The irony of this is that my aunt, his wife, had just started hospice care.  For three years, she had been fighting cancer that began in her lungs, metastasized to her brain, and the moved to her skull.  The tumor on her skull was only found recently but was already stage four, so although she fought back from lung cancer and then seemed to be recovering, or at least living stably with the brain cancer for a year or so, over the past couple of months, she rapidly declined, and there were no more treatments left for this last type of cancer.  As I write, she had not been told yet that her husband died, as this just happened. By the time I share this, who knows what will happen.  Her days were already limited; now that she has lost her husband of almost fifty years, who was her primary caregiver, she may have even fewer days. 

*** Edited to add - I started writing this Saturday late afternoon. On Sunday evening, my aunt also passed away, quietly. Her two children, 3 granddaughters, two remaining siblings, and her siblings-in-law, including my mom, were all at her apartment throughout the day, but as these things often happened, they had all just stepped into other rooms - my cousin to get her girls ready for bed in the other room, the others for a bite to eat or to make a phone call - when she faded away. She survived my uncle by about 36 hours. Her death was a mercy after a long struggle - now to join her husband.***

My uncle is my mom's older brother. They are about two years apart. They have a younger brother who is about seven years younger than my mom because my grandmother had secondary infertility and my grandfather had polio in those years. So my mom and uncle were close in age, but according to their stories, they were antagonists for most of their childhood - it sounds like he was a big tease, and my mom may have pushed his buttons in return. Their dad was a Disciples of Christ minister and my grandmother was the quintessential preacher's wife, a gracious hostess, lovely and kind. So, of course, the kids may have fit the stereotype of naughty preacher's kids in their youth, and in high school they fit other stereotypes: my uncle playing the role of golden boy, star football player and high achiever, and my mom the cheerleader and social butterfly.  

Despite the arguments and name calling they mythologized for us (Laurie Leadbottom being a classic name for my mom), they became very close as adults.  Part of the growth of this relationship may be attributable to my grandmother's Christmas Eve traditions, and perhaps some to the memories formed while growing up moving around as my grandfather was called to different churches, - or maybe because my mom found in my aunt the sister she always wanted. They and my other aunt loved each other greatly.  My uncle met my aunt after he went to college to play football in Oklahoma and then got a high school football coaching job in Fort Worth, where my mom's family had once lived, but by that time they were settled in Indianapolis, where my grandfather worked for the Disciples Church headquarters. My aunt was a high school English teacher who loved her subject and her students. She introduced me to Jane Austen and the beauties of Masterpiece Theater literary adaptations. 

Every summer and every Christmas, their family drove from Texas to Indiana for a week's vacation and reconnection with family, until about five years ago, when he and my aunt moved up from Texas to help their daughter take care of her three little girls after her husband left. 

That action tells you something about the importance of family to my uncle, but his entire life was a testament to the love he had for his family, including his nieces and nephews. Although he had a busy career as a high school football coach and then a second career as a missionary coach for Christian Sports Outreach International, twice every year, their family would drive the 15 hours from Fort Worth to Indianapolis to spend a week with the extended family. And every visit he would take the nieces and nephews out to a movie and a treat. My earliest memories are of going to Roslyn Bakery in Indy for their famous big yellow smiley face cookies (the original emojis - they might not have gone out of business if they could have latched onto that marketing scheme). Some years it was Steak and Shake or Dairy Queen. There were six of us for a long time and then four more younger cousins came along around the time my brother born and my younger uncle finally got married and had kids (I was their flower girl, and my first babysitting gigs were for them). We would all cram into my grandfather's long station wagon, a couple lucky ones getting to sit in the rear facing pop up seats in the trunk. Some years my uncle took the cousins in two groups - the older ones and then the younger ones because we older ones would want to see movies like The Goonies that had inappropriate parts. Those trips were pretty much the only time we went to the movies except for occasional drive ins during the summers at the lake, until I was in high school and could pay my own way.

The Christmas trips were marked by additional traditions. Christmas Eve was reserved for celebrating with my mom's side of the family. The Texas and Indiana cousins all met at my grandparents' house for a big dinner followed by a talent show of sorts where grandkids played a carol on an instrument they were learning or sang one with my grandmother accompanying them on the piano. Then my aunt would recite Luke 2, the Christmas story, by memory, and the aunts and my grandmother would tear up. Only after the Christmas message was proclaimed were we allowed to open gifts, one at a time, from youngest to oldest.  In those days, the aunts bought small gifts for all the cousins, and my grandmother would have 3 gifts for all the grandkids. Although most years, these gifts were tokens of love, not large gifts, when we cousins were teenagers, my uncle surprised everyone by secretly shopping at the cool stores - the Gap, Forenza or The Finish Line - and wrapping gifts from "Son of Santa" that delighted us - T-shirts or sweatshirts that were in style brand names, what teenagers wanted, not the usual grandma clothes.  Again, as an adult, I see the love in this more clearly. He let my aunt buy us our little gift, and then he splurged on his coach's salary for an additional treat, and kept the magic of Christmas alive for the teens, who were reluctantly still listening to scratchy violin solos by the younger cousins on Christmas eve. 

Those gatherings haven't happened in years. In the early years of our marriage, my husband and I would alternate spending Christmas with either my family or his family, so we kept participating in the Christmas eve gift exchange while the younger cousins were teens and my grandparents were still living. One of the last Christmas eve gatherings was around my grandfather's hospice bed. We all sang the carols around his bedside and my aunt tremulously recited the Nativity story. We took turns saying something to him as he lay locked in paralysis from Parkinson's disease. The next morning, back at my mom and dad's, as our kids were opening their Santa gifts, my mom got a call that he had passed away early that morning - gone to celebrate Jesus's birthday in Heaven as she told our young children. 

But when all of the cousins reached college and young adulthood and were getting married, that tradition slowly faded. There were a few years when our parents tried to gather us on an evening other than Christmas Eve, but the last year we went back Christmas was before we moved to Guam in 2011. 

Nonetheless, we still gathered with the cousins when we could. When our youngest was born, my aunt and uncle drove up from Ft Worth to Oklahoma City to meet her for a few hours - a six hour round trip drive for lunch at Sonic and some baby squeezes. They were almost as close as a third set of grandparents to my older kids. I will always be grateful to them for welcoming me and our two oldest, who were 1 and 2 at the time, to live with them in their little 3 bedroom house while I finished my last semester of grad school. Dan was deployed that winter, so I moved from Virginia back to Texas with the little boys for a semester. I remember trying to write papers on an old desktop computer in their back bedroom after putting the boys to bed, where I could also crank out a couple emails that the ship would get when they pulled into a port.  A couple students watched them on campus during my daytime classes, but I had a once a week night class, when my aunt would feed them and put them to bed after a long day of teaching high schoolers. On weekends we'd watch Masterpiece together or Rom coms. My uncle would chase the boys around the back yard and take them for rides in his classic convertible. Those days are like a long ago dream now, but I am still inspired by their willingness to take us in. That I was bold enough to ask them to is proof that I trusted in their generosity. 

Now they are gone, together. Their fiftieth wedding anniversary was approaching. Although Uncle Trent had had heart trouble in middle age, and had a triple bypass surgery at some point, he was still in pretty good shape, so his death was a surprise. He had been giving his all to caring for my aunt, while also still helping my cousin with her kids. He picked them up from school and helped get them settled back at whom while their mom finished her nursing shift. Then he would take care of my aunt, and continue to go back to Texas regularly to take care of his house and business there, and to spend time with their son, who was living in their house. They were planning to go back to Texas soon, since their granddaughters were now all in school and my cousin's hours were more regular. What a gift that they made that difficult decision to root up their lives so that they could care for their granddaughters and daughter and have those few years together. 

The last time I saw them was this past summer. We sat on the porch at my sister's house and told stories and laughed. My aunt seemed to be regaining strength at that time. We thought we might see them at Thanksgiving, but they had made the trek to Texas to see their friends and family there. And maybe that trip took too much out of them. Or maybe that trip was a blessing that squeezed more love into the world before they left. 

I'll be heading up to Indiana for the memorial service this weekend with our youngest, and then we'll all go to the service in Ft Worth when that takes place. Their lives are an inspiration to spend our time and money on connections, on loving others - which may be my resolution this year. Just go. 

A day of mourning

My day started out well. It's my 49th birthday. What a strange and unlikely thing! I don't feel a day over, oh, maybe 33 -- other than the persistent pain in my feet and the fact that I don't recognize myself in the mirror or photographs sometimes. Who is that person with gray hair and wrinkles? I remember feeling quite sad to leave my thirties behind when I was turning 40. I feel equally sorry to not be 40 something for much longer, but the difference between 40 something and 50 something seems much smaller that between 30 something and 40 something. A 30 year old could still be considered young. I am decidedly middle aged, if not on the edge of old. 

The morning began with gifts and a walk with friends and my daughter during which we talked about what to do with the gift of another year of life? 

My daughter, who is my walking partner once again now that she is home from college, thinks I should try to run another marathon since I did one in my 20s and one in my 30s.  I would like to do more writing, I say every year.  I also say every year that I would like to organize photos and make photo books.  I'd like to make another trip to CA, a trip to NC and to MI to see cousins, and a trip to Boston to see our second son and then a little jaunt up to Maine to meet his girlfriend's parents. I'd like to go backpacking again. 

I have no shortage of things I'd like to do. And I feel blessed that I will get to do many of those things, unlike the 19 children and their teacher who died today, or the 13 who were murdered last week in New York.  I didn't hear the news about today's tragedy until midday, but once I became aware of the catastrophe, the celebratory nature of the day was over. I can't even imagine the mourning that must be happening in Uvalde, a town that is only three hours away. Our 15 year old came home from school nervous. She saw some statistic that there have been 27 school shootings in 2022. That's a number that is difficult to fathom, impossible to explain. Far too many people who won't have the opportunity to celebrate the gift of another year or life. 

The death of child is tragic; the death of multiple children is unconscionable. May God welcome them to Heaven, console their families, have mercy on all, and send healing to the broken hearted everywhere.

Finding a reason to live

A week ago, on Fat Tuesday, I first sat down to write these thoughts.  It was the day to celebrate and eat cake and chocolate and wine. Bring out the feast before the fast!  We celebrated on Saturday with a Gulf Coast themed nod to the season and spent the rest of the week eating the leftover gumbo and dips and chocolate pecan cake and Girl Scout cookies and layer bars and hip cakes and chocolate almonds and the three pound bag of Swedish Fish, a gift to the newly minted 16 year old.  We had to empty the house of treats before we gave up sweets for forty days.

After all of the gluttony, I was ready to die to desires of the gut.  I was ready for Ash Wednesday and the "Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return" homily.  But recent reads and events have me remembering that the grave is nearer than I am comfortable with. I am not ready for death.

Death doesn't wait for readiness, though. A young mom in the community just died of a heart attack - a reminder that the measure of our lives may be shorter than we expect.  Although I didn't know her, I had several friends who did or who had children who were friends with her young daughter. My own daughter went to the memorial service with a friend and now can't stop talking about how the daughter's screams at witnessing her mother's death are what brought the neighbors over to see what was happening.  Her death made it clear how connected she was in the community, and how many people cared about her and her family.  It also reminded me to ask as Lent continues, that although I may resemble an end-times hedonist during Mardi Gras season, do I really live as if my last day is tomorrow?

Then my mother-in-law told me about the death of the OKC Thunder's coach's wife, who happened to be a track teammate from college, although she was a couple years older than me. I didn't know her, but I looked up her obituary after my mother-in-law called to tell me about it and to ask if I remembered her.  She and her husband started dating in college. He was a basketball player with a heart condition. She encouraged him to find Christ. They married, he got into coaching, they wrote a book together.  She also was a mother of five children. Three of her children were with her in the car crash that took her life. They survived. This article makes it seem more tragic that her life was cut short:  http://www.nola.com/hornets/index.ssf/2010/06/monty_williams_feature.html

Death by disease or accident is tragic, but death by suicide is even more so. This article about teen suicide from the Atlantic Monthly, (linked in an article in America Magazine, which was linked in a post at The Catholic Catalog) emphasizes how devastating and pervasive it is becoming. Why are so many teens ready to die? From the December issue. this article by Hannah Roisin (who also wrote about the benefits of free play) is about the high rate of suicide in Palo Alto, the wealthy suburb near Google headquarters and Stanford.  It's also home to a priest friend, whom we visited last year, at the Jesuit retirement home, which happens to be next door to a winery, which used to belong to the Jesuits when they also had a seminary there.

The young priests no longer live there. The old priests go there to die. And, as the America article points out, faith is dying in these young people from highly successful, highly driven families. And the children are dying.  They don't have any hope for a better future. They don't have faith that things will change. They evidently don't feel loved or capable of loving someone else. They don't have time or the inclination or the example of listening for God in silence.  They don't experience wonder and joy in creation.  They are weighed down by the pressures to succeed in their "work" of excelling -- and, I wouldn't hesitate to guess, although the study doesn't seem to take this into account, their devices.  Other reports have covered the increase in suicides related to social media abuse among teens.  (Other studies see mixed connections.)

What is going through someone's mind when they decide to take their life? My older daughter's friend saw, and described to my daughter, someone jump from the bridge last week.  She was in the car with her dad and saw a car stopped on the side of the road. Her father told her not to look, but she turned around to see a man falling through the sky, an image burned on her heart.  Did he experience a moment of joy while flying? Or regret?

Two families we know lost sons to suicide not long ago. And I will never forget a friend from our days in Chicagoland who killed herself leaving behind 10 kids, a mix of biological and adopted kids, after one of her sons committed suicide as a 16 year old. In her suicide note, she said she had failed as a mother because she had failed him and wanted to be in Hell with him.  I had nightmares for months afterwards and was hypersensitive to any negativity from my preteens.

At the same time, I have been reading on the recommendation of a friend who lost an infant daughter Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning. This book sat on my parents' shelf when I was growing up. It looked like a self-help book to me, and I was never interested in reading it, but my friend put her copy in my hands. It is underlined thoroughly - almost every page - and I can understand why. It is the moving memoir of a Holocaust survivor who found purpose for living and, as a therapist, was able to articulate to others why and how seeking meaning allows people to endure tragedy, unthinkable suffering, and also - by extension - the existential boredom of contemporary society. (thinking of this article from Books and Culture, A Christian Review about David Foster Wallace, whom I AGAIN tried to read and returned to the library before reading this piece which makes me interested, maybe, in trying again someday.)

But the book is much more than a self-help book, even though it is one, among other things. It is a memoir of surviving the concentration camps, ennobled by suffering with dignity, which is a reason for living.  He also wrote an explanation of a philosophy that every life has dignity and purpose and meaning and responsibilities, despite suffering, limitations, or loss, and a description of a therapy (logotherapy) based on the philosophy that everyone seeks meaning and purpose for life, and that meaning exists. Although it is not a work of theology, it is consistent with and supports a life a faith.

I want to press this book into the hands of everyone who thinks his life should be over. I wish the message of this book could be given to the man who jumped from the bridge. And to my friend who overdosed. And her son. And those teens in Palo Alto. And David Foster Wallace. And all the other poor lost souls who can't find a reason to live.

I know reading a book is not a cure for clinical depression. In the midst of darkness, a person on the brink of suicide is not going to be pulled back from the bridge's edge by reading this little paperback, but maybe it would encourage someone who is suffering to look into a different kind of therapy, or it might encourage someone who knows someone who is suffering to reach out.

Frankl survived the darkness and deprivation of the Holocaust because he believed his life had meaning, even though he had lost everything and was suffering excruciatingly.  At one time he found meaning in his work and writing.  When he lost his writing, he found meaning in wanting to rewrite his book.  When he had no energy to think of rewriting, he found a reason to live by contemplating his wife and his love for her. As he thinks of his wife's image during a cold hard march he realizes "The truth -- that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love."   He begins to understand the phrase, "'The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory' ... in a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way -- an honorable way -- in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment."

And in addition to finding meaning in loving another person, he was given strength to persevere by living the Shema, the prayer that begins "Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One," and which goes on to exhort the people to love the Lord and their neighbor, and to live these words and teach them to their children.

Frankl writes in the introduction, "Life holds a potential meaning under any conditions, even the most miserable ones. ... success, like happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself."  In other words, the more we seek success, or seek happiness as an end unto itself, the harder it is to attain those goods.  Naturally, as a person of faith, these concepts seem obvious. But do those privileged kids in Palo Alto (or here) understand that?

Finding meaning requires looking outside the self, a contrast to the advice of many contemporary gurus. Happiness can't be sought - it eludes the seeker more. Suffering, of some sort, is condition of being human and thus unavoidable. But it is not meaningless, nor does it take away meaning - or negate happiness, and can in fact add meaning: "... man's main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in his life. That is why man is even ready to suffer, on the condition, to be sure, that his suffering has a meaning."

Frankl quotes Edith Weisskopf-Joelson, a professor of psychology at the University of Georgia, on the topic of being unhappy - "our current mental-hygiene philosophy stresses the idea that people ought to be happy, that unhappiness is a symptom of maladjustment. Such a value system might be responsible for the fact that the burden of unavoidable unhappiness is increased by unhappiness about being unhappy.... logotherapy may help counteract certain unhealthy trends in the present-day culture of the United States, where the incurable sufferer is given very little opportunity to be proud of his suffering and to consider it ennobling rather than degrading." She wrote this in 1955.  It sounds like something she could say today.

And advocates for abortion and euthanasia would do well to read Frankl's book as a clear defense of the sanctity of human life, and the inherent value of each person. He writes, "But today's society is characterized by achievement orientation, and consequently it adores people who are successful and happy and, in particular, it adores the young. It virtually ignores the value of all those who are otherwise, and in so doing blurs the decisive difference between being valuable in the sense of dignity and being valuable in the sense of usefulness.  If one is not cognizant of this difference and holds that an individual's value stems only from his present usefulness, then, believe me, one owes it only to personal inconsistency not to plead for euthanasia along the lines of Hitler's program. That is to say, 'mercy' killing of all those who have lost their social usefulness, be it because of old age, incurable illness, mental deterioration, or whatever handicap they may suffer . . . Life's meaning is an unconditional one, at least potentially,.. Just as life remains potentially meaningful under any conditions, even those which are most miserable, so too does the value of each and every person stay with him or her, and it does so because it is based on the values that he or she has realized in the past, and is not contingent on the usefulness that he or she may or may not retain in the present."

There is so much I want to quote from this book to remember. I understand why my friend underlined so many passages.  Perhaps the most important premise that Frankl wants his readers to remember is that all life has dignity and has meaning. That meaning can be found in creativity or work, in loving another, or in suffering with dignity - in other words, in accepting being.  Meaning is found by receiving what life gives - in how we respond, in how we act with responsibility toward our conditions - not in imposing our will on life or finding something within.  We must look to others, and to our attitude toward our condition, and change that when we can't change our condition (a remark I remember my mom making - and a necessary lesson for military families, for any family).

Having faith that human life is in the image of the Creator makes believing that all life has value easier.  And Frankl makes a remark to this point to a patient: "Are you sure that the human world is a terminal point in the evolution of the cosmos? Is it not conceivable that there is still another dimension, a world beyond man's world; a world in which the question of an ultimate meaning of human suffering would find an answer?"

The Christian finds meaning in suffering when he lives Christ's command to love God and neighbor. In serving others, in creating beauty, in studying lives of people who lived with dignity and courage, in acknowledging and preserving memories of a good past, in seeing suffering as an opportunity to grow and to endure, in simply living the life he is given, man finds meaning. Faith, hope, and love follow.  This really good article in Maclean's summarizing a study on faith and teens makes clear that teens who have faith are less likely to suffer depression.

Someone needs to say to the man about to jump, to the teen about to overdose: you will be missed, you are needed, you have more life to come, to survive, to embrace. You exist. Continue. Life is the gift.

After the funeral

May already! Time for catching up:

First a funeral.

Each rose represents a member of the family.
The different colors are for different generations.
There were 54 roses altogether. And my grandmother
was an only child. . . 

My trip back to the states for my grandmother’s funeral was very brief.  It took me as many days to get back on schedule as the number of days I was gone.  My husband convinced me that I should take one child with me as a representative of the others at the funeral.  I feared cries of injustice from the five left behind, but they all seemed to accept that one getting to go was better than none – maybe they realized that the house would be one-sixth less noisy.  And we also explained that others were going to get opportunities for traveling at other times. So my nine year old daughter was my travel companion, and a very good one she was. We never really had a heart to heart conversation, but we enjoyed the serendipity of airplane meals, watching travelers in line for security checks, and resting on each other’s shoulders during brief naps on the flight. And my daughter carried six roses up to the vase in the picture above, while I carried two, to help fill in the overflowing, somewhat chaotically enmeshed, arrangement of flowers that represented my grandmother's fondest accomplishment: being matriarch of a close, loving, although sometimes quibbly, but always faithful family.  She presided happily over birthday parties, Christmas celebrations, graduations, marriages, and the other ceremonies and daily rituals that mark the rearing of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

I debated returning for this funeral because I had just made the visit with my grandmother in January. At the time, I had decided I would rather spend time with her living than dead.  And we had a wonderful visit.  Knowing that it might be my last, I made an effort to be present, to listen, to ask questions.

But despite the financial sacrifice for the airline tickets, as well as the sacrifice of sleep and health, I’m glad I made the trip again, not because I felt the need to say goodbye, but because there was more of her to get to know. Listening to what my cousins and aunts and uncles had to say, browsing through all the old photos, hearing the pastor talk about my grandmother’s ministries in her church, all made me realize there were questions I didn’t ask, stories I didn’t hear during the last visit, that would help complete the picture of the person my grandmother was. As my mom has mentioned while cleaning up my grandmother’s house, here are all the pieces of a life, one that was well-lived, but perhaps underappreciated, as all lives might be. Everyone's memory of the same person reveals some additional facet of her personality. How can we ever really know another fully…

In one of her journals unearthed in a visit to the home emptied of her physical presence, but full of her spirit, she had written this piece of advice: "Look for everyday blessings that sometimes seem very mundane. A flower! A butterfly! A phone call! A special book! A song! A beautiful day! In all things be thankful."

One of the photo collages my sister-in-law assembled.

Four generations a generation ago.

I really admire the custom here on Guam have holding several nights of rosaries, sometimes entire novenas, after loved ones pass away.  Barbecues are held at different family member’s homes, or all at one central place, so everyone has a chance to come and pray and talk and share stories.  And often there are advertisements in the paper for one year anniversary parties after a death.  Maybe these are just excuses for the living to gather for good eats, but why not use any opportunity to revisit good memories and strengthen family ties? I'm glad I grabbed the chance to spend time with the siblings and cousins. Worth every penny and lost minute of sleep.

On the way home we had a short layover in Tokyo. The airport was clean, modern, and quiet. The lighting was cool, the waiting area decorated with geometic, but comfortable chairs, and the toilets all offered bidets, which my daughter mistook for the flusher.  One of the little stores had an origami exhibit that we meandered through. A fine introduction to Japanese culture.

Little Red Riding Hood

A soul ascending? The little matchgirl?

Other benefits of travel: ample time for reading (some books which I finished on the plane I may review soon), a brief experience of spring, a visit with our old dog, a view of the Alaskan skyline, time to laugh with cousins.

More updates soon. I give my class their final tomorrow night, and then I'll have more time for gathering thoughts.  

Gathering eggs just after sunrise.

Bosco has lost weight on the farm.

An out of focus mayapple, one of my favorites.

A bouquet of dogwood, phlox, and asters gathered
by the granddaughters.

Meanwhile, back at home, soccer season ended with a win.

From the plane window over Alaska. Seredipitously,
the movie on the flight was Big Miracle about the rescue
of whales in Barrow, Alaska.

A Feast and a farewell

Today is the feast day of Blessed James Duckett, who was martyred after he converted to Catholicism during the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He is the patron of book sellers and printers because he converted after reading a Catholic pamphlet and from that time was fervent about distributing Catholic books on the sly. His bookbinder turned him in, hoping to receive a lenient sentence for another crime, but they both hung together. Duckett will always be memorable to me as a reader, and as a failed collaborator in a literary project.



Tomorrow I leave to go to my grandmother’s funeral. She died peacefully this past weekend after being diagnosed with a strange stomach cancer back in the fall. I’m so thankful for the visit we had in January. Her death was not a surprise except in that it was so soon and that it came without suffering, a mercy for my grandmother and my mother. My grandmother had nursed my grandfather through Parkinson’s and seemed fearful of being a similar burden.  My mother was looking forward to nursing her, but her prayers for answered.

And now we pray for her soul and for safe travels.

Back soon.

Glowing endorsement for a don't miss film

My husband and I watched the most beautiful movie last night – Departures. I’m going to admit my lack of cultural awareness when I say I had never heard of it, even though it won the Academy award for best foreign language film last year. I picked it up at the library last week because it was made in Japan, little knowing that it would prove to be such a moving story about treating the dead with grace and dignity.

Departures, or “Okuribito” in Japanese, tells the story of a young Japanese cellist, Daigo, whose orchestra is disbanded. Out of work, he and his wife move back to the northern town where he grew up. His mother has died and left him a house; his father abandoned them when he was a small boy. Daigo finds an advertisement in the want ads for a worker in “departures.” He applies without realizing that he is going to be working for a type of undertaker, or “nokanshi,” preparing dead bodies for burial.

Of course it turns out that the old undertaker who hires Daigo is an intuitive man with a great respect for the dead and their families, and a great zeal for life, or at least for food. The film moves from Daigo’s initial disgust for the job to his understanding of its importance and his appreciation for the artistry with which his mentor works.

Not only does the movie provide a thoughtful meditation on corporal mercies, but it also offers great reflections on marriage and relationships between parents and children. In the rituals of death, all the vulnerabilities of life are revealed.

It is impossible to watch this film without wondering if the setting, an idyllic village far from Tokyo in both distance and convention, was destroyed by the tsunami. As far as I can tell from some quick internet searches, the filming location was mostly in Sakata, which is on the coast opposite of Sendai, where the airport was underwater. The film makes you realize what a horror it must be for a culture with such a beautiful casketting ceremony to bury thousands of bodies in mass graves without this reverent preparation for life after death.

I can’t recommend this movie highly enough.

 A beautiful evocation of “Remember you are dust and unto dust you shall return.”

Someone else is crying now

The Angel of Death has been busy: My Syrian friend’s mother, another friend’s mother-in-law, the daughter of my husband’s co-worker, my son’s teacher’s mother, and most recently, a young man in my husband’s regiment who shot himself in the head.

The previous deaths were all sudden, but of natural causes. The last is harder to understand.

News of a suicide is always unsettling. When you hear about someone who on the surface seemed relatively happy – someone who had just made a dentist appointment, who had a new girlfriend, who was doing well at work - it makes you feel a little dizzy, like you’ve been punched in the stomach by while having a friendly conversation.

I didn’t know this young man, but my husband says he wasn’t on drugs, was fit and a hard worker, and although he had gone through a rather bitter divorce, he now had a girlfriend who was in the military, also, and had earned good marks. So his life was looking up.


Until it wasn’t. The chaplain told my husband, in their late night conversation while waiting for news in the ER, that most men think of suicide for a brief time, but don’t act on it unless alcohol and guns are available.

Part of the tragedy in this situation was that when the young man was found by his devastated friend, his heart was still beating. He has been on life support for three days because his next of kin is the almost ex-wife. Apparently some divorce paperwork has not been completed, so she has the legal responsibility of terminating life support. She, meanwhile, is deployed in the far east, but is on the way home. So the hospital is keeping the heart and lungs working. Organ donation is questionable because the Mormon mother, who is too unhealthy to travel here, doesn’t want her son cut up and because, after days of life support, the organs may be too weak and medicated.

I don’t know the theology of when the soul leaves the body. Is the soul lingering there in that brain-dead body, regretting its decision? Did he have a moment of repentance as the trigger was released? Or was he conscious for part of the several hours he lay on the bloody bathroom floor before his friend broke into the apartment and discovered his body, swollen with still circulating blood and fluids?


This situation has not been hidden from the kids because everyone was milling about getting ready for bed and heard when my husband received the first call and said “Oh no” – or the sailor’s variant of that. So it has become a topic of family prayer and conversation – or rather lecturing on my part. How can I drill into my own children that life is always worth living, especially when I’ve been suffering myself a bit from winter doldrums or PPD, post party depression, after the holidays? (Even my six year old told me I was crabby most days yesterday.) I believe but fear what the chaplain said about everyone contemplating suicide at some point – that “who would miss me if I were gone” line of thinking. If only this boy’s friend had arrived a few hours earlier, to be that face of someone who would miss him. To reach out and touch him and reconnect him to the world of his fellow sufferers.

Perhaps witnessing the sorrow of their dad and hearing about all the people who are involved in mourning this young man, seeing the concentric waves of sorrow as the news filters into the community, especially wounding those who have lost someone else from suicide, will help my children to see how many people would miss them were they gone.  I watch my tongue, try to be cheerful, and give them extra hugs at night.

On mourning

A friend’s mother died suddenly just over a week ago. This friend is from Syria and had not been home to see her mother in three years, and her mother had come here to visit only twice, years ago, both times staying close to a year after the birth of her grandsons. I met this friend through our kids, of course - her sons are friends with my older boys. But she is also a part of a circle of friends who are expats living in coastal Mississippi: one from Mexico, two from Columbia, two from South Africa, and this friend who is from Syria. Somehow, I’ve been included – I guess being a Midwesterner is foreign enough.


After I heard the news, I called and left a message offering condolences and food. She texted back, saying thanks, but no thanks. If it weren’t for the urging of one of the Columbians, a psychologist, I wouldn’t have taken her a lasagna last Sunday. But my psychologist friend was very adamant that we “make a drama” so that she will have a good bereavement.


I was a little nervous about entering the house of mourning, and planned to just drop off the food and run. But my friend invited me in and seemed to welcome the opportunity to talk. So for close to an hour she told me stories about her mother and their relationship: The suddenness of her death from a pancreatic stone which was misdiagnosed initially as food poisoning; how her brother scheduled the funeral for the next day, knowing she couldn’t get there in less than 36 hours; that she does not plan to return to Syria, although the other expats are urging her to go back to visit her father, to whom she is not as close.

I called my mom after the visit.

Now I think I would rush back home, if I were in her situation. I would want to see my mother’s grave. I would want to stand where she might have stood last, to see the places she loved. I love going home. I do feel expatriated in many ways.


One of the things my friend mentioned was how she talked on the phone to her mom everyday; if it weren’t for her mother’s encouragement and advice, her marriage would be faltering, her health would be in decline, her sense of self would be crushed. She apparently has formed few friendships here, even after living here 15 years. So not only does she feel orphaned because she has lost her mother, but though it is trite to say, she also lost her best friend.


More than one person relocated here has commented how difficult it is to make friends with the locals, despite the reputation of Southern hospitality. Everyone is friendly and helpful, but few invite you over for coffee or Sunday dinner. And I understand that – as much as I need friendship and helpful neighbors, I also know I’m going to be moving again in six months. So I don’t blame the people who have grandparents and cousins around for not making our family a part of their fold. But this friend from Syria, and my other expat friends, are here for the duration. Fortunately, they have each other to rely on. But you do sometimes feel sorry for the kids. They get invitations to birthday parties that include the whole class, but not invites to come over after school on Fridays or to play on Saturday afternoon. My 8 year old daughter is the one who feels this most keenly. She would love to spend more time with some of the girls in the class, but their mothers are friends in Junior League together, so they spend time with each other.


On Sunday, my psychologist friend arranged a memorial mass followed by a potluck at the parish hall. The mass was a regularly scheduled Sunday evening mass, and the priest told a tactless joke at the end about 3 souls who were asked by St. Peter about what they wished they heard at their funerals. (The last one answers that he wishes he heard “Look, he’s breathing!” Groan.) But it was well attended, and many people offered condolences and stayed for the supper.

As people finished eating, my friend stood up to offer her thanks for this outpouring of sympathy and assistance. She commented how she thought she was so alone and was full of fear after she heard the news of her mother’s death. But what she discovered was this wellspring of affection and friendship: the presence of friends. Now she wants to give back more and invited everyone to a meal in a month in honor of her mother, a Syrian tradition. Tears were flowing from all the sentimental types. It was a moment of real fellowship. And my Columbian friend was right – the drama had made her bereavement better.

Encomium

Continuing with the theme of death, the other day my mother sent me a clipping of an obituary of our old next door neighbor. Until the time I was seven, my family lived in Indianapolis on the east side in the same neighborhood where my mother and father had gone to high school and where my grandmother had grown up. For a long time, that place was home, and the place we moved to was the “new house.” The new house had a rural route number, although it was on a street of newer houses surrounded by cornfields. The first house was in a neighborhood of small bungalows and cape cods nestled close together that now must be nearing the century mark.

Our house was a little limestone number with green trim. It had a low roof like a bungalow but no front porch. Instead, the front yard was graced by a crabapple tree in one corner and a redbud in the other, and by the front door was a little imitation courtyard garden, with a wrought fence enclosing bleeding hearts, lily of the valley, and daffodils, all clustered under a small dogwood tree. In my memory it was glorious – straight from the pages of a Tasha Tudor book. But when as an adult, I drove by with my husband, all those colors in the front yard had vanished.

The inside wasn’t quite as quaint: gold shag carpet, lattice wallpaper with big yellow flowers, wallsized mirror in the living room. Green shag carpet covered the back bedroom that Betty and I shared with a big green piano. That room, I think, had been a porch and had indoor/outdoor carpet when we first lived there. My first brush with home decorating was when my parents put in real carpet. I remember wanting to sleep on that plush surface with all my stuffed animals.


So that little house was cozy, but not beautiful on the inside. On the other hand, the neighbors' house, a white cape cod, was all loveliness. The couple who lived there had grown children who visited sometimes but not for long. These neighbors were kind and warm, unlike the neighbor on the other side of us, who seemed the incarnation of Mr. McGregor. I would climb on the wooden fence in the backyard and call to the nice neighbors for an invitation. And sometimes – often? -- they would invite me to come over. The Mr. mostly did yard work like the neighbor on the opposite, but he let us jump in his leaf piles. The Mrs., whom I called by her first name, would invite me in for little cucumber/Wonderbread sandwiches with the crusts cut off. We would practice good manners. She tried to teach me to knit. She taught me "Pretty is as pretty does" when I went fishing for compliments (or maybe to lower my expectations to a more fitting level for a homely child). 

The highlight of my visits were following her upstairs to the room with eaves and dormers where her daughter’s dolls were kept. This room was pink and green, my favorite color combination, and the bedspread was frilly and girlish. Was there a white wicker vanity or am I making that up? I don’t remember actually playing there, only gazing in awe at the dolls and books, as if visiting a museum to 1960’s girlhood. I wonder if that room was ever redecorated after we moved away.


According to the obituary, a long, informative one, the Mr. and Mrs. were married over 50 years when the Mr. died in 1995. By the time I knew them, they were retired, but previously they both worked relatively unglamorous jobs – she was a secretary at a steel company. But having a glamorous job apparently wasn’t what motivated her. She apparently enjoyed community life, as the obituary lists her membership in several clubs, activities at her church, and her work as a docent at the Benjamin Harrison Home, where she wore period dresses to give tours to schoolchildren. The couple travelled to Europe and went out dancing until they were in their eighties. Someone cared enough to include in the obit small details such as that the Mrs. was a book lover and an avid newspaper reader. I love this bit: “Until she became ill, she was still enjoying going out to lunch each week, always wearing red lipstick and high heels.” In addition to a list of survivors, the obit lists a number of friends and caregivers to whom thanks were owed. Contributions were directed to the Methodist Church down the street from the house in the old neighborhood.


What a full, happy life. What a gift was her kindness to little girls. I’m sorry that as an adult I never told her how thankful I am for those memories, although thanks were probably unnecessary. She likely enjoyed our little tea parties as much as we did.

Requiem

We’ve had a couple weeks of high festivity: spirit week, a carnival, birthday parties, a trip to a corn maze, trick or treating. In between trick-or-treating Sunday and the school's Halloween carnival last Saturday, I think the kids each have consumed at least a gallon of high fructose corn syrup. Add to the loot collected at those celebrations, goodie bags from classmates and the neighbors handed out during the week and three birthday parties Saturday. One of my six year old's favorite treats was a little plastic vial full of pink corn syrup with a gummy worm inside. Good thing we had a dentist appointment on Monday.

Since our neighborhood doesn’t have many kids – and has that seedy factor - we trick-or-treated on base with some friends. The mom of this family is from Bogota, and they had us over for a Columbian soup called ajiaco.  I made pan de muerta, my nod to the holy days, with the last bits of Moroccan saffron we had brought back from Spain a few years ago.

The base housing community was one big block party: kids ran from house to house without fear of cars, but several families really got into the fright factor. One had an inflatable haunted house and a party in the driveway with scary adult clowns and zombies. Another family had converted the garage into a gory laboratory. Lawns were dotted with skeletons and tombstones and glow in the dark cobwebs. It seems as if the south likes to celebrate Halloween big. Or maybe it’s getting this big everywhere. When a sexy pirate wench walked up to school Friday to pick up her kids, I had to figure maybe the mardi gras mindset down here has seeped into the fall festivities.

The fall festival fundraiser for the kids’ school last weekend also had a Southern feel. Each class ran a couple carnival game booths, and the booth that had the best décor won a prize. Some booths decked out their tents with the traditional skeletons and spiders, but others glammed up with tulle and glitter everywhere. Kids dressed up for the costume contest, and my 10 year old won a $30 gift card to Walmart for his mime costume. The jr high CYO manned the haunted house in one half of the parish hall, while in the other half, parents shopped at the silent auction and kids’ art sale and decorated pumpkin sale. There was a cash raffle, a live auction, a dunk tank, a raffle to get out of bingo duty, a bake sale – all the popular school fundraisers rolled into one glorious sugarhigh event.

Meanwhile, the Methodist Church across the street had their fall festival on the same day – an alternative to Halloween? Maybe they didn’t realize that our school was celebrating the same day, or maybe they hoped to lure in some of our overflow. But theirs was a much smaller event – only a few game booths and food.

And a tractor pulled hay ride.

Monday morning we found out that a twelve year old boy jumped off the hay wagon and fell under the tractor. He was killed almost immediately. He was the son of the pastor. One version of the story has the pastor as the driver of the tractor. Apparently, the emergency vehicles all arrived while the festivities continued uninterrupted at our carnival.

My imagination keeps returning to this event. I can’t quite work out how the boy fell and where he was and what his body looked like when they pulled him out from under the wheels. Saturday afternoon I saw a kitten hit by a car scuttle to the side of the street, and I keep trying to make up an alternative ending to the story of this boy, who was the same age as my second son.  Maybe he could have rolled away or laid still between the wheels.

Today the school kids, some of whom knew this boy from their neighborhood, remembered this young man.  We prayed the prayer for the dead in Latin class:

Réquiem ætérnam dona eis, Dómine; et lux perpétua lúceat eis. Fidelium animae per misericordiam Dei requiescant in pace. Amen.

Like the students, I want to raise my hand and ask for prayers for my grandparents and for a couple friends whose children are now motherless and for all those parents who have lost children.

Another saying  I came across while doing my research for Latin class: Vivere disce, cogita mori

Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes

Inspired by beginning A Song for Nagasaki for Reading for Believers, I picked up Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, a true story retold by Eleanor Coerr, to read one night to the kids. My young listeners were too busy playing to pay attention to the first 30 pages of the story.  And since it is only about 50 pages long, that means they only listened for about a third of the book. But the second third is most moving. The kids couldn’t believe that Sadako actually died. (They were waiting (hoping?) for someone to die in Little House.) How could the author let the main character, a little girl die? Why does the Author of life let anyone young die?

The owners of our local donut shop recently lost their 9 year old daughter, who attended the neighboring Catholic school, to brain cancer. Our children had been praying for her every day at school. They also prayed for my friend, the mother of their friends in Illinois, every day, and she died of cancer recently, too.  Several years ago, we were able to be at the bedside of the kids' young aunt, who also succumbed to brain cancer.  Other friends and family members remain on our prayer list for the time being.


When I was the age of my oldest, the only people I knew who had died were a couple great-aunts and a friend's grandma.  So far these encounters with the deaths of young people haven’t scandalized my kids or given them nightmares about leukemia. No one has asked why our prayers haven’t been answered the way we want them to be answered - maybe because I’ve talked to them about this idea before, maybe because they just aren’t to that level of critical thinking. They’ve been the funerals of three great-grandparents, and even looked in and touched the body of my great-grandmother, the only one with an open casket, without qualms. But those funerals were peaceful events, celebrating long, well-lived lives.


The death of a young person is harder to comprehend. It was brave of the author to write about Sadako. She writes plainly, without sentimentality. The temptation is not to introduce to children the idea they could die any time (although I admit a perverse pleasure in telling my children the gruesome beginnings of some nursery rhymes). The book only hints at the devastation and despair that must have accompanied the deaths caused by the atom bomb – from the immensity of that tragedy the author spares her readers. Instead she directs their empathy toward a particular victim, Sadako, who becomes a face for all those who died.  It is much easier to comprehend, and mourn, an epic tragedy when we "know" one of the sufferers.


The book had several references to the family’s religious practices, but they were described in such a way that the kids didn’t discern anything in contradiction to Catholic practice, nor was the Shinto practice belittled. I appreciated being able to read without having to edit.


Below are photos of statues of Sadako from three different Peace Parks - in Seattle, two statues from the Children's Peace Park in Hiroshima, and the last from Santa Fe.

A death in the family

We have a somber household today. This morning a member of our menagerie expired. Rosie, the friendly miniature lop rabbit, is no more. A couple of weeks ago, she began drooling, and I suspected something was amiss. But we were busy getting ready to go to OKC and finishing reading fair projects, so I didn’t call the vet. And she was a hand-me-down rabbit – hard to justify spending $60 for a vet visit. About 2 months ago, I did actually take her to the vet to have her teeth trimmed because she wasn’t chewing on anything. My suspicion is that she developed an abscess or infection as a result of this trimming, and maybe the vet would have discounted an antibiotic. But we didn’t go.

When we returned from our trip, she looked worse: a bald patch appeared under her chin from drooling, and her cheek looked swollen. I finally called the vet to schedule an appointment on Friday. But Friday afternoon she had blood under her nose and was wheezing. She also had shrunk from not eating. I hemmed and hawed about taking her. I didn’t want to pay for treatment for a dying animal. I also didn’t want to look like a bad pet owner to the vet and my kids. After consulting my rabbit killing father, my husband agreed to put her “to sleep” himself. I cancelled the vet appointment.
By the time husband returned home, the rabbit was lying on her side. She looked like she was going to breathe her last any minute. Why knock her head with a blunt object or smother her if she was just going to fade out on her own? The kids all patted her and went to bed bawling about how nice she was and how sad to wake up with one less pet.

But she was still alive in the morning.

I started to feel a little guilty. Should we put her out of her misery? She didn’t seem to be suffering visibly. Neither I nor my husband wanted to be the one to “put her down” with a swift bludgeon to the head. Why is it that we feel compelled to kill animals near death? I try not to anthropomorphize our pets, but if they aren’t miserable, why go ahead and kill them? Is there a little unconscious sadism at work? How many dogs die naturally these days? Of course, dogs start to pee the carpet and get snippy when they are dying. This rabbit was just lying there. And eventually she died, like my 11yr old’s rat, who spent about 4 days shrinking until he finally breathed his last.
If we keep our small pets partly as teaching tools for our kids, they are useful for teaching about caring for the dying as well as the living, a reminder of that forgettable 7th corporal act of mercy. I was a bit squeamish about touching dead things, but my kids reached in and patted the rabbit and carried her out to her grave in the backyard, and wept as they shoveled dirt on her already stiffening body and said a few prayers of thanksgiving for her life.
The younger kids were similarly without fear this past summer when my grandmother lay in her coffin. They reached in and patted her hands and stared and said goodbye without self-consciousness, while I held back and felt awkward standing at her coffin. This grandmother was free with her commentary on the appearances of corpses, and I think she would have been pleased with her own appearance, although she looked thin. May she rest in peace and find happiness in Heaven.