One Year Ago Right Now; Today...No Man is an Island

One year ago, right about now, I was going to bed. I had just finished writing on this blog: May 8, 2005--A Son Turns 18. My topic was Aaron at 18. He was in the family room with Cathy and Patrick watching Grey's Anatomy. I finished my post and paused as I walked to the stairs.

Absolutely, positively, I considered walking into the family room to watch the rest of the show with them. Absolutely, positively, the idea that there are more times to watch TV and too few quiet moments to read crossed my mind...I honestly assure you that thought streaked through my mind. I chose to go up to read. I never saw Aaron again. I heard his voice once more when he called me at about 4:02 pm on May 9th and when I called him back around 5:00 pm that day. But I never saw my son again. If resentment ruled my emotions, I might never have read again.

It was Mother's Day on May 8th, a year ago. We had a comfortable day at home. Aaron, Patrick, and I may have lounged a little too much for Cathy's comfort. I made smoked briskett. We ate late afternoon on the deck. The kitchen needed to cleaning up and Sunday night is trash night. Cathy let us know it was still Mother's Day and we jumped into action. "She's not my Mom" I often told the boys. But when I acted more like their brother than their father, Cathy responded to us all in the same way. We know the saying, "When Mom aint happy, aint nobody happy." Patrick, I remember continued to grumble. Aaron told him to just do his job. I carried the garbage cans out with Aaron; we each held a handle. Patrick lugged the newpapers and cans.

In the warmth of the spring morning sun, I told Aaron about the awakening I had from a story my friend Spencer Stewart pointed out to me. "I'm able to be the Father you need today. I don't have to regret the past, because the past is not today, and I don't have to worry about the future because the future is not today. You need me to be a Father to you today and I can be the Dad you need today." After that, I told Aaron all that I admired about him. I told him how I need to be more like him in some ways. All those years before I had tried to make him be more like me, and in the end I needed to be more like him. Beautiful.

Today I am reading to understand Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island. Here are a few samples of wisdom from Chapter 5:

His love is much stronger than death that the death of a Christian is a kind of triumph. Although we rightly sorrow...we rejoice in their death because it proves to us the strength of our mutual love. The conviction in our hearts, the unshakeable hope of communion with our dead in Christ, is always telling us that they live and that He lives and that we live.

It takes heroic charity and humility to let others sustain us when we are absolutely incapable of sustaining ourselves. We cannot suffer well unless we see Christ everywhere-both in suffering and in the charity of those who came to the aid of our affliction.

In the end...more than a passive acceptance of whatever comes from Him, we must desire and seek in all things the positive fullment of His will. We must suffer with gratitude, glad of a chance to do His will.

The last two sentences best state what I've learned on this year long journey. Immersed in a deep sea of sorrow for one desperate year, I can confidently say, God DOES NOT take our children. God does not punish us by killing our children. Humans die because the body is relatively fragile and not immune from disease or gravity. When a loved one's day of death comes too soon, we suffer because we love all that is human of that person. What was given to us by God is not the death, but the love we shared. What is given by God is the emotion of sorrow.

Today I accept the love we shared with Aaron--the love I shared with Aaron. I accept the sorrow we experience. This sorrow is the one that is felt in every fiber of our body. Eyes, brain, muscles, stomach, heart-if a part of the body has a nerve, it hurts. Parents sometimes say they can't imagine the pain. I understand. I'm living it and seeing it in my wife and son and I can't imagine it. But, I accept the sorrow, and have gratitude for it because it comes from God and with these gifts of love and sorrow we can do God's will.

God's will isn't to have despair. God's will is to heal despair with acts of mercy and forgiveness.

The only value of our life is that it is a gift of God. Chapter 6.

Feeling connected to the safety of God's mercy in the people who touch us,

Tom