For me, the month of May will always be filled with grief and sadness. More than a decade ago, I unexpectedly lost one of my younger brothers. He was in his early twenties. Loosing a young adult member is never easy for a family, particularly for a parent. It is not natural for parents to out-live their children.
I have finally realized that sometimes you do not get over certain grief in life. You learn to live with it as you often go back and forth between anger, denial, guilt, and disappointment. I recently came across Dr. T. J. Wray’s writings. She is an adult sibling survivor and professor of Religious Studies at Salve Regina University in Newport, RI. In her book Surviving the Death of a Sibling: Living Through Grief When an Adult Brother or Sister Dies, she writes:
“In the stillness of the early mornings when I have the house all to myself, I can recall his face and the sound of his voice so clearly that I’m often surprised, when I wake from my reverie…and ask, “Why?” Never expecting an answer.”
I think that says it all.
Loss of family members and loved ones is undoubtedly a significant part of a human life. And this month we have certainly seen a mass loss of human life around the globe.
According to recent BBC reports, 55,239 people are now known to have died in the May 12 earthquake in China. More than 5.47 million people were homeless and 5.46 million buildings had collapsed. 281,006 were injured, and 24,949 people remain missing.
In Myanmar, about 78,000 people have died and another 56,000 are missing since Cyclone Nargis struck on May 2. An estimated 2.4 million people remain homeless and hungry following the cyclone. Yet unlike Indonesia and Bangladesh after major natural disasters, Myanmar’s ruling generals have blocked large-scale foreign assistance.
Last year, Cyclone Sidr killed more than 3,000 people in Bangladesh and left millions homeless. Here at home, this month, in the Midwest, where my in-laws live, many suffered major family losses and destruction from several tornadoes. Not to mention the countless loss of life around the world on a daily basis due to man-made war, diseases and calamities.
Earlier this month I was in San Francisco and Half Moon Bay. My mind was especially occupied with these thoughts as I drove through the winding roads from San Francisco to Half Moon Bay. I stopped at a Buddhist meditation center for a couple of hours before I headed home that week to further reflect on life’s losses and grief.
Despite all the sorrows we go through there exists an enormous courage and faith in each of us that moves us forward, gives us hope, makes us think about our next generation.
This month, I also found two books particularly comforting (not to mention inspiring). Reading these books took me on a human journey back and forth between grief, loss, and eternal hope. One is by Sidney Poitier – Life Beyond Measurement, Letters To My Great-Granddaughter. Throughout the book, Poitier shares stories about the people of courage he has met along the way and the meaning of life as he ponders his legacy and shares his life lessons.
The other one is by Randy Pausch – The Last Lecture. A computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon, he was asked to give such a lecture; he didn’t have to imagine it as his last, since he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. But the lecture he gave was a summation of everything Randy had come to believe. It was about living. This book is about his story of living in the face of death.
The ending of Portier’s book particularly moved me as he finished it by writing:
“Hope is the eternal tool in the survival kit for mankind. We hope for a little luck, we hope for a better tomorrow, we hope – although it is impossible hope – to somehow get out of this world alive.
And if we can’t and don’t, then it is enough to rejoice in our short time here and to remember how much we loved the view.”
Perhaps the best view of the month was watching my little boy with his tiny friends dance on stage! All the impossibilities of life suddenly became possible. In that instant, it reminded me not to let the pain of one season destroy the joy of all the rest. A few nights later I looked up my son’s book by Dr. Seuss – Oh! The Places You’ll Go…nothing could be more hopeful than when you read this to a child. They are the words for a new life promised with new hopes and dreams:
Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!
You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
:
:
So be sure when you step.
Step with care and great tact
and remember that Life’s
a Great Balancing Act.
Just never forget to be dexterous and deft.
And never mix up your right foot with your left.
And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)
KID, YOU’LL MOVE MOUNTAINS!
So…
be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray
or Mordecai Ali Van Allen O’Shea,
you’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So…get on your way!
