Lament

I wrote the following to honor my best friend, companion, and soon to be husband, ---, who died in a helicopter accident in his thirty ninth year and to voice my grief. Although it is intensely personal, I will present this in hopes that I can help those of you who find themselves with us in the company of mourners, to understand and let others know you are not alone.

It happened at 10 a.m. It would have been near the end of his first fuel cycle, each lasting approximately two hours. This time of year, March 17th, 2006 to be exact, he typically lifted off around 8 a.m.

The call came around 8 p.m. I could look at my phone records, I have them, but at this point in time have no desire to look. It was ---'s mom. "---, how are you doing?" in an odd voice, like I wasn't supposed to be doing okay. I knew something was wrong immediately. It was her test question, had I heard? A skeptical, "ummm, okay..........I think" was my answer because I knew something wasn't okay. Sure enough that was quickly confirmed. "We lost ---." After that I don't remember. I don't remember if I said anything. I don't remember if --- said anything. I don't remember if I hung up. I don't remember. I just don't remember. What I do remember was falling to my knees. I remember the worse pain I have ever felt. If someone would have had a gun to my head I would have pleaded with them to kill me right then and there to put me out of my misery. I remember crying. I remember shaking. I remember pacing like a crazed animal in a cage. So many emotions, what to do, where to go, what to say, not real, not real, not real, not real, not real, no, no, no, no, NO. I remember slamming my fists to the floor over and over until they were swollen and bruised. The pain of that I couldn't even feel, it was masked by the pain in my heart, the pain in my soul....the deepest pain that I have ever felt and surely the most pain I will ever feel as long as I live.

He was hard worker, kind, generous, NEVER said a bad word about anyone, whether they had done him wrong, whether he knew them or not....they could have been a murderer, child molester....he still would have never said anything bad. he was sensitive, he was empathetic, he was loving, he cared about everyone. he treated everyone like they were a someone and all equally. from a janitor at mcdonalds to a CEO he had the ability to make everyone laugh in any situation. he never put anyone down, if anything, he went out of his way to help out anyone in need. he had a soft spot in his heart for those at the "bottom", because he had been there. he started out on the ground as a logger, so when he made it to the top, he didn't forget where he came from. he fought, struggled and worked his tail off to get to the top. someone gave him a break and he felt he could do the same for someone else at the 'bottom' his success never went to his head. he wasn't racist, he wasn't biased, he wasn't, he just wasn't bad. he was loyal, loving, gentle. he was soft spoken, he was attentive to others feelings, he was thoughtful, he was humble, he wasn't afraid to cry, he wasn't afraid to be real, he wasn't afraid to talk about his feelings, he wasn't afraid to ask for help, he wasn't afraid to admit his mistakes, he wasn't afraid to ask for advice, he wasn't afraid to swallow his pride, he wasn't afraid to say i was wrong or i'm sorry. he was romantic, he was a super father who always strived to be better. he thought he could always be better....he felt he needed to strive to be a better father, a better partner, a better pilot....whatever he wanted to accomplish, he wanted to be the best and he would do whatever it took to get there. it didn't matter how many times you told him he was the best, he always thought there was room for improvement. he was a provider and felt it was his duty to provide the best for his family. he was always happy, he was always smiling, he was always laughing, he was always in a good mood, he was a dreamer, he was full of ideas, he was a thinker, he was smart, he contemplated, he was curious, he wanted to always try new things, he wasn't afraid, he had no fear, he was spiritual....yet he wanted to know more, he was inquisitive. he was clean, he was neat, he was tidy, he was working on being organized :), little things made Kenny happy, he wasn't materialistic, he liked to save money, yet he would splurge on the best if he had to. he never did anything half ass - his heart and soul was in every little thing he did, from his job, to parenting, to his relationships. he could cook, he could fix anything, he was domestic, he was could be a rugged hard working logger or he could put on a business suit and put on a presentation. he could fix a car, then turn around and watch a chick flick. he loved flying, he loved it til the end when he realized there was so much to live for and so much to lose, then he wanted out. if he only hadn't went "just one more time." he was a top notch class act gentleman.....without a doubt, one of a kind. are there other men out there like him? i really doubt it.

Sometimes people take others for granted. I'm sure a lot of people took --- for granted. We don't treasure each other enough. I didn't take --- for granted, I NEVER took --- for granted. I take a lot of things for granted in my life, even if i try not to. I can't answer why I didn't take --- for granted. Well, I can. As I told my pastor during our marriage counselor class "look at him, he is beautiful, how can you not be affectionate towards him, how can you not tell him how precious he is." This came during the course of a conversation of our strengths and weaknesses in relationships. My weakness had been showing affection and sharing feelings, but as my pastor stated, "you don't seem to have that problem with ---" All the while we were holding hands, laughing and sometimes hugging throughout the course of session. --- brought the best out in me. I never knew someone could do that until I met ---. I had heard it talked about and now I was living it. --- brought the best out in everybody. Everyday I thought of how blessed I was that God would bring --- into my life. I NEVER wanted to lose ---. Every morning I prayed for ---'s safety and thanked God for him....EVERY DAY! I felt as long as I showed him everyday how much I appreciated him and loved him, he would never doubt my love. Everyday that was my goal and --- knew this. We had both agreed on that one simple thing. Always show and tell the other person how much you love them every opportunity you have, that way neither of us would ever doubt the other. So I can honestly say that I NEVER for one second took --- for granted. I treasured every minute we were together. What bothers me the most now, is I see couples who take each other for granted or they don't show each other affection and I just want to scream....you don't know, you could lose that person tomorrow, then how would you feel. You would live with regret for the rest of your life. Too many people are too casual in their relationships, that is sad to me, because I know they would regret it if their partner ever died. Thank God I have no regrets.

He was a treasure to us for thirty nine years, for me three. When my treasure was snatched away I really realized what a treasure he was. I always knew he was the best thing that had ever happened to me, but after he was gone, I really realized that he was even more of a treasure than I even thought. The pain of the no more outweighs the gratitude of the once was. Will it always be so? I didn't know how much I really loved him until he was gone. Is love like that? If you've lost someone you understand this. If you haven't then, well, I pray you never understand this.

Gone from the face of this earth. I gaze at the helicopter in the sky, and suddenly I think: He is not the pilot. I go to a ballgame and find myself singling everyone out; none of them is he. In all the crowds and streets and rooms and churches and stores and gatherings of friends; on all the moutains, I will not find him. Only his absence. Just silence. "Will --- be coming to my house today?" "--- should be calling me right after dusk." "Is my phone ringing ---?" "Are those messages on my phone ---?" "--- should be walking through the doorway anytime now." "I'll wake up next to him tomorrow morning." Now only absence and silence. When we gather now there's always someone missing, his absence as present as our presence, his silence as loud as our speech. Still the whole family, but one is always gone. When we're all together, we're not all together.

It's the neverness that is so painful. Never again to be here with us - never to sit with us at the table, never to travel with us, never to laugh with us, never to cry with us, never to embrace us as he leaves or returns home, never to see his children grow....so many nevers. All the rest of our lives we must live without him. Only our death can stop the pain of his death.
A month, a year, five years - with that I could live. But not this forever. Anyone who complains that they are away from their loved one for a weekend, two weeks, a month, a year, I think lucky you, at least you get to see them again. They make me angry. "Just one more time" and now this endless neverness.

I had to drive up to our place to remove his belongings. Grim duty. These were his belongings. Everything in there spoke of him - the prints on the wall, flight manuals, our pint of favorite ice cream, charger parts book, a flight suit, leftovers that were supposed to be finished, pictures of us, those two movies we were supposed to watch. Everything neat and tidy. But where was the person who owned these things? Where is the life that gave these things meaning? His clothes hang limp.

I stand before the church where we were supposed to get married. It's our day. The ceremony is at one. I'm there 5 minutes early. I walk up the steps to the doors. They're supposed to be unlocked. They're not. I look through the window. I see nothing; no form at all, not even a trace. No body, no smile, no silhouette, no love embodied. Where he should be, I stare straight through. If I close my eyes hard enough, I see him. I see him standing there. He's beautiful. He is so beautiful. I cry just like I told him I would. He has on his black tuxedo. His dad and --- are standing next to him. My sisters and --- are on the other side. Behind Pastor --- I see our flower arrangement on the alter. The pews are packed. I see my family in the front and I look to the other side and there is ---'s family. The place is packed. People are standing in the back, it's a small church. I hear --- playing the wedding march. I'm about to take the first step to the happiest day of my life and then a car drives down a dirt road in the distance. Tears stream down my face and the happiest day of my life is still the day --- proposed to me.
Turn it back. Stop the clock and turn it back, back to that Thursday, that last Friday. Let him do it over; get up late this time, too late to leave for Oregon, too late to fly. Let him do it right this time. It won't stop; it keeps going, unforgiving, unrelenting. The gears and brakes are gone. There's nothing I can do to make it stop. Farther back and farther yet, back into the dimming past. The gap begins to gape. Is there no one who can slow it down, make it stop, turn it back? Must we all be swept forever on, away, beyond, beauty lost, and love, sorrow, until the measure of our losses has been filled?

He was at the peak of vitality and promise. He had finished flying and was ready to take on his business. Much to his delight he had found the Lord 9 days earlier. Friends who had visited with him a week earlier said they had never seen him so enthusiastic. He was looking forward to his own business, committing himself to "his wife" and children, committing himself to the Lord, to building our new house, to getting married. He was exercising, he was eating healthy. He had never felt better. All his hard work, here it was, it had all paid off. He had "made it!"
Death is the great leveller, or so they say. They are right, but they have neglected the solitude of suffering which accompanies. We say, "I know how you are feeling." But we don't.

On the way back I thought about tears. Our culture says we must be strong and that the strength of a person in sorrow is to be seen in their tearless face. Tears are signs of weakness. But why celebrate stoic tearlessness? Why insist on never outwarding the inward when the inward is bleeding? Does enduring while crying not require as much strength as never crying? Must we always mask our suffering? May we not sometimes allow people to see and enter it? And why is it so important to act strong? I have been graced with the strength to endure. But I have been assaulted, and in the assault wounded, grievously wounded. Am I to pretend otherwise? Wounds are ugly, I know. They repel. But must they always be swathed? I shall look at the world through tears. Perhaps I shall see things that dry-eyed I could not see. Tears don't come from my lack of strength, they come from the pain in my heart.


The world looks different now. The pinks have become purple, the yellows brown, the blues black. Mountains now wear crosses on their slopes. Photographs that once evoked laughter and smiles now cause only pain. Why are the photographs so incredibly hard for me to look at? The pleasure of seeing or talking to his old friends is tainted by the realization that they were his friends, they were his coworkers and that while they thrive, he is dead. Something is over. In the deepest levels of my existence something is finished, done. My life is divided into before and after. A friend of ours said it meant for her that her youth was over. I know what she means, something is over. Like alcohol and drugs age your outward appearance and make you look 20 years older, death does the same to your insides. Your mind, your soul, your heart. I feel like I have aged a 100 years within this last year. My feelings, my thoughts, my perspectives, my believes. What is important to me has changed. Everything has changed. I am not the same person. Death has aged me a lifetime. I feel like a 90 year old now, my insides are tired and I'm ready to go. Death speeds up the aging process only no one can see it because it all happens to my insides. Yeah, something is over. Something is over in places where he and I were together. This sense of something being over washes over me. It happens not so much at home but other places. A moment in our lives together of special warmth and intimacy and vividness, a moment when I specially prized him, a moment of hope and expectancy and openness to the future: I remember the moment. But instead of lines of memory leading up to his life in the present, they all enter a void, a place of blackness and never come out. The book slams shut. The story stops, it doesn't finish. The future closes, the hopes get crushed. And now instead of those shiny moments being things we can share together in delighted memory, I, the survivor, have to bear them alone. So it is with all memories of him. They all lead into blackness. It's all over, over, over. All I can do is remember him. I can't experience him. The person to whom these memories are attached is no longer here with me, standing up. He's only in my memory now, not in my life. Nothing new can happen between us. Everything is sealed tight, shut in the past. I'm still here. I have to go on. I have to start over. But this new start is so different from the first. Then I wasn't carrying this load, this thing that's over. Sometimes I think that happiness is over for me. I look at photos of the past and immediately comes the thought: that's when we were still happy. But I can still laugh, so I guess that isn't quite it. Perhaps what's over is happiness as the fundamental tone of my existence. Now sorrow is that. Sorrow is no longer the islands but the sea. Yes, that's it. It is the fundamental of my being. Case in point: "Can sadness be relieved, or can one only pass it by, very slowly? A day in the radiant sunlight and the sky's blue, in the shadow of a tall palm tree, lapping of the tide on the seashore, wouldn't that help to get past sadness? - for a while, for that one day at least." Yes, things make me laugh, smile and feel good, but only for that moment. Then the moment passes and the fundamental of my being is back, I am sad. I am sad because I could not share my happy moment(s) with ---. I am sad for so many reasons and they all have to do with --- not being here.

Let me try again. All these things I recognize. I remember delighting in them - trees, books, music, sunsets and sunrises, work well done, flowers, friends. I still delight in them. I'm still grateful. But the zest is gone. The passion is cooled, the striving quieted, the longing stilled. My attachment is loosened. No longer do I set my heart on them. I can do without them. They don't matter. Instead of rowing, I float. The joy that comes my way I savor. But the seeking, the clutching, the aiming is gone. I don't suppose anyone on the outside notices. I go through the motions. What the world gives, I still accept. But what the world promises, I no longer reach for. I've become an alien in the world, shyly touching it as if it's not mine. I don't belong any more. When someone loved leaves home, home becomes mere house.

I walked into a store. The ordinariness of what I saw repelled me: people putting onions into baskets, squeezing melons, hoisting gallons of milk, clerks ringing up sales, "How are you today?" "Have a good day now." How could anybody being going about their ordinary business when these were no longer ordinary times? I went to work and along the way I saw people preparing for their day, talking on the phone, sharing a joke in the office. Do you not know that --- fell from the sky and he's gone? He's nothing but ashes now.

Imagination and thought are out of phase. Some time's it's as if he's not dead, just away. I see him. Then thought intervenes and says, "Remember, he's dead now." For almost a year now I have been imagining what he's been doing. That keeps me going. In me now there is this strange flux of spontaneously picturing him and then painfully reminding myself. And not just picturing; also hearing. I hear his voice loud and clear, "Dammit, I've been up since 5" or sometimes I hear him say, "Honey, I don't know what happened but now your phone won't work" I hear his voice all the time.

His hair will always be dirty blonde/brown with a little grey by his ears. His hair that made him look "sophisticated" I used to say. But his hair will always be that color, only the living age.

Out of my self I traveled on a journey of love and attached this self of mine to ---. Now he is gone, lost, ripped loose from love; and the ache of loss sinks down, and down, deep down into my soul, deep beyond telling. How deep do souls go? Loss is his as well. His sudden earthly death is not only ours but his: the loss of seeing trees, of hearing music, of reading books, of walking, of visiting friends, of raising his children, of being with family, of marrying, of going to church, and - dare I say it - of flying.

Grief isolates. Shared grief isolates as well. It isolates the sharers from each other. Though united in that we are grieving, we grieve differently. As each death has it's own character, so too each grieve over a death has its own character. The dynamics of each person's sorrow must be allowed to work themselves out without judgement. I may find it strange that you should be tearful today but dry-eyed yesterday when my tears were yesterday. But my sorrow is not your sorrow. There's something more: I must struggle so hard to regain life that I cannot reach out to you. Nor you to me. The one not grieving must touch us both. It's when people are happy that they say, "Let's get together."

What do you say to people who are suffering? Some people are gifted with the words of wisdom. For such, one is profoundly grateful, for they are few and far between. Some blurted out strange, inept words. That's okay too. They tried. Your words don't have to be wise. The heart that speaks is heard more than the words spoken. And if you can't think of anything at all to say, just say, "I can't think of anything to say. But I want you to know that I am here with you in your grief." Or even, just embrace. Not even the best of words can take away the pain. But please, don't say, it's not really so bad. Because it is. Death is awful, it's horrible. If you think your task as comforter is to tell me that really, all things considered, it's not so bad, you do not sit with me in my grief but place yourself off in the distance away from me. Over there, you are of no help. What I need to hear from you is that you recognize how painful it is. To comfort me, you have to come close. Come sit beside me on my mourning bench.

I know: People do sometimes think things are more awful than they really are. But no one thinks death is more awful than it is.

Some mourners say nothing because they find the topic too painful for themselves. They fear they will break down. So they put on a brave face and lid their feelings - never reflecting. So when you ask me how I am doing and I respond with a quick, thoughtless "Fine" or "Okay," stop me sometime and ask, "No, I mean really."

And now he's gone. That future we embraced was destroyed with ---. He slipped out of my arms. He slipped out and was smashed.

Was --- special? Did I love him more than my parents? Did I love him more than my sisters? Did I love him more than my grandparents? Did I love him more than my nephews? Did I love him more than his children? Did I love him more than his parents? When they see my tears do they wonder if I love him more? I love them equally, though differently. None is special; rather, each is special. Each has their something of their own which I delight. I celebrate them all and love them each. Death has picked --- out, not love. Death has made him special. He is special in my grieving. When I give thanks, I mention them all; when I lament I mention only him. Wounded love is special love. I think of him everyday; the others I might not. Of them all, only he has a grave.

The worst days are now holidays and anniversaries: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, New Years Eve, birthdays, our wedding date, March 17th - days meant as festivals of happiness and joy are days of tears. The gap is too great between day and heart. Days of routine I can manage; nothing is expected. There are always one too few, but on holidays it's painfully obvious. I'm the only one at celebrations without someone.

With these hands I touched his face, I held his hand, I traced every bit of his body. Now at the end of these same hands I held his ashes. Was this really the same body, the same person? He's all in here? What happened to my ---, I never got to touch him....just one more time.

I died that cold March day. I was in his helicopter as he went down. I replay it over and over in my head. I get the same pit in my stomach when I realize I'm going down. I get the same pit in my stomach when I realize this is it, life for me is no more. I get the same pit in my stomach as it all happens so fast, yet it's all in slow motion. I have the same thoughts in my head, what I'm about to leave behind. I'm there as it nose dives into the side of the mountain. I died with --- that cold March day. My life is no more.

I know this might hurt to hear
But it's --- in my heart that I hold so dear
So if you should find God's taken my hand
And led me away to the promised land
Please don't cry, don't shed those tears
Here I come ---, that's all he'll hear
It will come to be, us together after all this time
You see, being apart wasn't good for the mind
This is how it was meant to be
Him with me and me with he
So when it gets sad
Stop to think I am glad
That pain that hurts to the core, well,
I'm with --- and it hurts no more

Although the world is full of suffering, it's also full of overcoming. - Helen Keller

Life goes on they say, but how come when someone you loves dies, that's the last thing you want. Sure, life goes on for everybody else, but not for me. My life stood still the day --- died. The world keeps on going all the while I'm struggling to keep my head above water. I just want to scream at life...."no, you can't go on, --- is back there, we can't leave him behind. Stop, can't everyone just stop. I don't want to leave --- behind!!" The more life goes on the further I am from ---. So while life goes on I've stayed here, my life is stagnant, but at least I'm as close to --- as I can possibly be right now.

Innocent questions make me wince
Innocent conversations make me wince
Innocent interaction among couples make me wince
Talk about weddings makes me wince
Talk about having children makes me wince
Talk about building a house or remodeling makes me wince
Talk about death and funerals makes me wince
Talk about dating or relationships makes me wince
Talk about wives, husbands, kids, family, boyfriends, girlfriends makes me wince
On and on and on and on. Just don't talk.

Elements of the gospel which I had always thought would console did not. They did something else, something important, but not that. It did not console me to be reminded of the hope of resurrection. If I had forgotten that hope, then, yes, it would indeed have brought light into my life to be reminded of it. But I did not think of death as a bottomless pit. I do not grieve as one who has no hope. Yet --- is gone, HERE and NOW he is gone; NOW I cannot talk with him, NOW I cannot see him, NOW I cannot hug him, NOW we cannot share our plans for the future. THAT is my sorrow. "Remember he is in good hands." That reality does not put --- back in my hands NOW. That's my grief. For that grief, what consolation can there be other than having him back? Nothing fills the void of his absence. He's not replaceable. We can't go out and get another just like him.

There's a hole in the world now. In the place where --- was, there's now just nothing. A center, like no other, of memory and hope and knowledge and affection and love and laughter which once inhabited this earth is gone. Only a gap remains. A perspective on this world unique in this world which once moved about within this world has been rubbed out. Only a void is left. There's nobody now who saw just what he saw, knows what he knew, remembers what he remembered, loves what he loved. A person, an irreplaceable person, is gone. Never again will anyone apprehend the world quite the way he did. Never again will anyone inhabit the world the way he did. Questions I have can never now get answers. The world is emptier. My world is gone. Only a hole remains, a void, a gap, never to be filled.

Jesus Walks
Feet don't fail me now
Before you take my name
Take my blame
Feel my dirt
Conceal my hurt
See my bruise
Walk in my shoes
You wasn't there when I was in deep thought
You wasn't there when I had no choice
So who cares?
I walk with God
I got the scars to prove it

Endurance of faith. This is the message in the book of Job. God decides when it's one time to come home. God made the decision that it was ---'s time. Death is understood as a normal instrument of God's dealing with us. The Bible says God is pained by death. Paul says death is the last great enemy to overcome. My pain over ---'s death is shared by God's pain over his death. Seeing God as the agent of death is one way of fitting together into a rational pattern God, ourselves and death. I cannot fit it all together by saying, "He did it," but neither can I do so by saying, "There was nothing He could do about it." I cannot fit it together at all. I can only, with Job, endure. I do not know why God did not prevent ---'s death. To live without the answer is precarious. I have no explanation. I can do nothing else than endure in the face of this deepest and most painful mystery. I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and resurrecter of Jesus Christ. I also believe ---'s life was cut off in its prime. I cannot fit these pieces together. I am at a loss. To the most agonized question that I have ever asked I do not know the answer. I do not know why God would watch him fall from the sky. I do not know why God would watch me wounded. I cannot even guess. I am not angry at God, but baffled and hurt. My wound is an unanswered question.

I am at an impasse, and you, O God, have brought me here. From my earliest days, I heard of you. From my earliest days, I believed in you. I shared in the life of your people: in their prayers, in their work, in their songs, in their listening for your speech and in their watching for your presence. For me your yoke was easy. On me your presence smiled. Noon has darkened. As fast as she could say, "We lost ---," the light dimmed. And where are you in this darkness? I learned to spy you in the light. Here in this darkness, I cannot find you. If I had never looked for you, or looked but never found, I would not feel this pain of your absence. Or is it not your absence in which I dwell but your elusive troubling presence? Will my eyes adjust to this darkness? Will I find you in the dark - not in the streaks of light which remain, but in the darkness? Has anyone ever found you there? Did they love what they saw? Did they see love? And are there songs for singing when the light has gone dim? Or in the dark, is it best to wait in silence?

Faith and lament. A tug of war. My faith endures, but my address to God is uncomfortable and altered. It's off-target. I want to ask for --- back but I can't. But I do, knowing full well it won't happen. But what if....??? Stranger things have happened. Sometimes I aim around the bulls-eye. I ask God to protect the members of my family and his family. But then again I asked that for ---, every morning. Every day, at least once a day. Lament and trust are in tension, like wood and a string bow. "My tears have been my food day and night." I am downcast and disturbed, yet my faith is not dead. I have grief, I lament and I my faith is tested. Back and forth, lament and faith, faith and lament, each fastened to the other.

Have I changed? Not does the world look different, but have I changed? My character has it changed? The suffering of the world has worked its way deeper inside of me. Not only my sorrow, but the sorrow of anyone who has ever lost someone. I know it all too well now. I never knew that sorrow could be like this. One month before, I had gone to the funeral of a friends, a co-workers. I tried to imagine the quality of his wifes grief. I know now that I failed miserably. Each person's suffering has its own quality. No outsider can ever fully enter it. Yet more of suffering is now accessible to me. I still don't fully know what it's like to lose a son or daughter. I still don't fully know what it is like to lose your partner of 50 years. Yet I know more of it. And I know now about helplessness - of what to do when there is nothing to do. I have learned coping. We live in a time and place where, over and over, when confronted with something unpleasant we pursue not coping but overcoming. Often we succeed. Death shatters our illusion that we can make do without coping. When we have overcome absence with phone calls, winglessness with airplanes, summer heat with air conditioning - when we have overcome all these and much more besides, then there still abides one thing with which we must cope: death. I have changed, yes. For the better, I do not doubt. But without a moment's hesitation I would exchange those changes for --- back.

The gospel tells us more of the meaning of sin than of suffering. Of sin it says, the roots lie in the human being, not in God. Sin belongs to us. God's response to this sin is forgiveness - not avenging fury, but forgiveness. To the 'why' of suffering we get no firm answer. It eludes us.

I have nothing to go home to, I have nothing to look forward to.

Faith is a footbridge that you don't know will hold you up over the chasm until you're forced to walk out onto it. I'm standing there now, over the chasm.

With every fiber of my being, I long to talk with --- again. What would I say? I don't know. Maybe I would just blurt out something silly. That would be good enough for a beginning. We could take it from there. Every day I wonder, and some days I doubt, whether that talk will ever take place. But then comes that insistent voice, "Remember, I made all this and raised my own son from the dead, so I can also...." I know, I know, but why doesn't he raise --- now? Why did you ever let him die? If creation took just six days, then why does re-creation take so agonizingly long?
When I say my first words to --- I think I will cry out of happiness. First and foremost I would want to know that he is okay and if he is in fact in Heaven and it's pretty and all it's chalked up to be. I would want him to be safe and happy. If I knew that I would feel better. Then I would want reassurance that we will in fact see each other again, if he said yes, I could breathe. I could exhale and for the first time since he left us I would be okay. And smile really meaning it.

I'm surrounded by death now. As I walk through the woods, as I drive down the road, it lurks everywhere - behind, to the left, to the right, ahead, everywhere in my world. Before, I rarely saw it. Every now and then, here and there. The light was too bright. Here in this dim light the dead show up: our architect, my co-workers, grandparents, uncles, ---'s friends, my friends, the parents of friends, colleagues. 11 people in less than one year. All around me they are dying. Traces and memories of the dead. I live among the dead until I join them.

I would run across the world to bring you the sun.

Made in the image of God: That is how the biblical writers describe us. To be human is to be an icon of God. In what respects do we mirror God? In our knowledge. In our love. In our justice. In our sociality. In our creativity. These are the answers the Christian tradition offers us. One answer that rarely finds its way onto the list: in our suffering. Perhaps the thought is too appalling. Do we also mirror God in suffering? Are we to mirror him ever more closely in suffering? Was it meant that we should be icons in suffering? Is it our glory to suffer?

Standing on a hill in Galilee Jesus said to his disciples:
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
Blessings to those who mourn, cheers to those who weep, hail to those whose eyes are filled with tears, hats off to those who suffer, bottoms up to the grieving. How strange, how incredibly strange. When you and I are left to our own devices, it's the smiling, successful ones of the world that we cheer. We turn away from the crying ones of the world. "Blessed are those who mourn." What can it mean? One can understand why Jesus hails those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, why he hails the merciful, why he hails the pure in heart, why he hails the peacemakers, why he hails those who endure under persecution. These are the qualities of character which belongs to the life of the kingdom. But why does he hail the mourners of the world? Why cheer tears? It must be that mourning is also a quality of character that belongs to the life of this realm. Who then are the mourners? The mourners are those who have caught a glimpse of God's new day, who ache with all their being for that day's coming, and who break out into tears when confronted with its absence. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm peace there is no one blind and who ache whenever they see someone unseeing. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm there is no one hungry and who ache whenever they see someone starving. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm there is no one falsely accused and who ache whenever they see someone imprisoned unjustly. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm there is no one who fails to see God and who ache whenever they see someone unbelieving. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm there is no one who suffers oppression and who ache whenever they see someone beat down. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm there is no one without dignity and who ache whenever they see someone treated with indignity. They are the ones who realize that in God's realm of peace there is neither death nor tears and who ache whenever they see someone crying tears over death. The mourners are aching visionaries. Such people Jesus blesses; he hails them, he praises them, he salutes them. And he gives them the promise that the new day for whose absence they ache will come. They will be comforted. Jesus says: Be open to the wounds of the world. Mourn humanity's mourning, weep over humanity's weeping, be wounded by humanity's wounds, be in agony over humanity's agony. But do so in the good cheer that a day of peace is coming.

Those who sow in tears
will reap with songs of joy.
He who goes out weeping,
carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
carrying sheaves with him.
Psalm 126

What is suffering? When something prized or loved is ripped away or never granted - that is suffering. Or rather, that's when suffering happens. What it is I do not know. Some do not suffer much, for they do not love as much. Suffering is for the loving. If I hadn't loved, there wouldn't be this agony. Anything ever loved than lost causes suffering. Love in our world is suffering love. Jesus said "You shall love thy neighbor as thyself." In commanding us to love, God invites us to suffer. God is love, that is why he suffers. To love our suffering sinful world is to suffer. God so suffered for the world he gave up his only Son to suffering. The one who does not see God's suffering does not see his love. God is suffering love. That said, it could be said that suffering is the meaning of our world. For love is the meaning, yet love suffers. But the mystery still remains. Why isn't Love without suffering the meaning of things? Why is suffering Love the meaning? Why does God endure our suffering? Why does he not at once relieve his agony by relieving ours?

"Put your hands in my wounds," said the risen Jesus to Thomas, "and you will know who I am." The wounds of Christ are his identity. They tell us who he is. He did not lose them. They went down into the grave with him and they came up with him. Rising did not remove them. He who broke the bonds of death kept his wounds. In my living, my ---'s dying will not be the last word. But as I rise up, I bear the wounds of his death. My rising does not remove them. They mark me. If you want to know who I am, put your hand in my wound.

Do our wounds heal? Does this gaping wound in my chest heal? Does my suffering over ---, which I did not choose and would never choose, does that bring peace? How? To whom? Can suffering over death - not living at peace with death but suffering in the face of death - bring peace?

Suffering may do us good - may be a blessing, something to be thankful for. This I have learned. Ordinarily we think of the powerful and wealthy as blessed; they enjoy the "good things of life." But maybe the little ones, the down-trodden peoples and assaulted persons are blessed as well. I do not mean that they will be compensated for their sufferings. I mean that perhaps the treading down is itself a blessing, or can become a blessing, rich as any coming to those we call "the lucky ones." Suffering is the shout of "No' by one's whole existence to that over which one suffers - the shout of "No" by nerves and gut and gland and heart to pain, to death, to injustice, to depression, to hunger, to humiliation, to bondage, to abandonment. And sometimes, when the cry is intense, there emerges a radiance which elsewhere seldom appears: a glow of courage, of love, of insight, of selflessness, of faith. In that radiance we see best what humanity was meant to be. That the radiance which emerges from acquaintance with grief is a blessing to others is familiar, though perplexing: How can we treasure the radiance while struggling against what brought it about? How can we thank God for suffering's yield while asking for its removal? But what I have learned is something stranger still: Suffering may be among the sufferer's blessings. In the valley of suffering, despair and bitterness are brewed. But there also character is made. The valley of suffering is the vale of soulmaking. But now things slip and slide around. How do I tell my blessings? For what do I give thanks and for what do I lament? Am I sometimes to sorrow over my delight and sometimes to delight over my sorrow? And how do I sustain my "No" to ---'s early death while accepting with gratitude the opportunity offered of becoming what otherwise I could never be? How do I receive my suffering as blessing while repulsing the obscene thought that God crashed ---'s helicopter to make me better?

Suddenly here he is again. The chain of suggestion can begin anywhere: a phrase heard in a conversation, an unpainted board on a house, a lamp pole, a stone. From such innocuous things my imagination winds its sure way to my wound. Everything is charged with the potential of a reminder. There's no forgetting.

Now he's gone. I've had to restructure myself. His family has had to restructure themselves. Not only do we have a gap within us, but a gap among us. A gap among our families. We have to live differently with each other. We have to live around the gap. Pull one out and everything changes.