It seems perfectly natural, doesn’t it? If you have a question, go look it up in a book. I’ve been doing it all my life. I was taught how to do research in school, and now it’s my first instinct. If I need a fact, I find a book with the answer. If I don’t have the right book, I go to the library or the bookstore. Well, some time ago, I found myself browsing aimlessly in a bookstore when it suddenly occurred to me that, indeed, I was looking for answers, but answers to what? I could not find answers until I knew what my questions were, and there were no books in the store that could help with that. Where could I look, then?
That was when the idea seriously crossed my mind that I had to finish my letters to my son, Andrew, letters that I had been writing for years, in part to help me discover my own questions and perhaps answers as well.
You see, on May 19, 1988, I watched helplessly as Andrew was hit by a truck and killed. He was eight years and eight months old, almost to the hour. And so I wrote. I wrote to him because I had to find a way to stay close, to continue to relate to him, and to find myself again. And I wrote to share my letters, so as not to feel so alone after what I have learned has been the most isolating experience of my life. I would not, for the world, wish that anyone live where I live, and have lived, but I do accept and cherish visitors.
Grief and loss are inextricably bound up with fundamental life questions, so no grief is simple. There are many issues that can arise, from guilt to anger, from blame to fundamental questioning of the whole fabric of being. Ultimately, what is the hardest about any grief is the sense of pure loss.
I have learned, both from my own experience and from that of others, that grief is not well understood, nor well tolerated, in our society. Grief is an inherently isolating state. The sense of loss and dislocation contribute to a general lack of connection with oneself, and with the universe as a whole. Certainly, it does not help anyone for us to compare losses, with the possible conclusion that one loss is “worse” than another. All losses require a difficult grief process. All deaths are untimely. All deaths are too soon. Ultimately, all losses prompt the same fundamental and unanswerable questions, especially, “why?”
Loss is not something we get over. We are changed forever by the loved ones in our lives and equally by their passing. No wonder that grief work is the hardest work we will ever do. It is not, as our society would like us to believe, over in two weeks so that we can “move on”.
For me, the pure shock of my son’s death lasted about a year, after which I began to experience the intense pain of the reality of our loss, both mine and Andrew’s. In dreams, I experienced myself as separated from him by a low, unscalable wall, a wall that extended indefinitely in all directions, a wall that left me to mourn alone on a sundrenched, shadowless plain. Why was he in the street at that time? Why didn’t the driver see him and stop? These were imponderables, yes, but often all-consuming, sometimes to the point of obsession.
Then, in time, the pain went too deep for words and even for tears. There was a core of loss and grief that seemed to concentrate in the center of my being, where the “self” is located, and every thought, every idea, every perception passed it by en route to my consciousness. In the process, then, a piece of the sadness, like a weight, was added onto the traveler and all that I saw, all that I knew and all that I felt were a part of the pain, and, in turn, partook of the pain. And so, there was a heaviness that was a companion to all I was and all I did.
At this time, I learned to minimize the distance between my inner world and my outer world by sharing with accepting friends and family. However, when that was impossible, I found that, if I mirrored my inner feelings by creating an outward symbol, even a small and anonymous one like a candle, then I could succeed in building a bridge that overcame my emotional isolation.
Sometimes, though, the most important thing to do is the hardest. Someone we have loved has died and we are in pain. We are vulnerable. And now, we need to be open to new love, new caring, not as a replacement, but to continue to allow our hearts to grow. That is the choice of life. How soon? Immediately? No, not necessarily, but soon. We must commit to life not just because it honors our loved ones, but because it leads to the questions and answers that we need to continue to heal, and because anything less is just survival, a kind of emotional stasis.
Finally, we must commit to life because never to love feels empty, much as to love and lose feels empty. But the former is the emptiness of a dry, unused glass, overlaid with the dust of discarded dreams. The latter is the emptiness of a drained mug of thick, sweet nectar, its sides still moist with poignant memories, at once the most fragile and the most durable of our possessions. I do understand. Knowing does not make doing less frightening.
I know that it sounds strange to say, “Choose life”, as if I were saying, “Wear sunscreen”. It sounds silly or, worse, trivial, but it is neither.
Can we simply decide one day that we will commit to life and that’s it, from now on we are on the “right” path? Probably not. Sometimes, during the darkest nights, we must decide again, and again… Decide as often as you have to, but choose life. Since 1988, I have welcomed new love often. I have many cherished new friends and family. All have enriched my life immeasurably. It now seems that, while the hole in my heart left by Andrew’s loss has not shrunk, my heart has grown larger around it.
How long will this take? The answer is that there is no timetable for grief. It ebbs and flows and seems to replay its basic themes from different perspectives in the gradual unfolding of our lives. Grief has its own energy and its own drives, and each new loss tends to recall previous losses. Sometimes, grief will not be denied.
My own mourning turned a corner on the 10th anniversary of Andrew’s death, when I experienced a flood of memories of his life that, for the first time, transcended the overwhelming memory of his death. My major task, it now seems, has been to learn how I would continue to be Andrew’s father after his death. Even though death ends a life, it does not end a relationship.
Over thirty years after Andrew’s death, grief is not over, but I have integrated it into my core being and I tolerate its less and less frequent demands. I know my questions now and maybe even some of the answers. Thirteen years after my son’s untimely death, after almost two hundred pages of letters, I wrote him the following…
Dear Andrew,
I am changed. I know that now. I knew it then, too, that my life would never be the same, but it’s different somehow than it has been. Something has been happening to me lately. I’m not sure what. People have been telling me that I seem different, and I know it’s true. They have been saying that they can see it in my face, and I have to take their word for that. I do know lots of things that I never used to know.
I know that relationships evolve over time, and ours has been no exception. Though I always imagine you to be an eight-year-old boy, even in my dreams, I speak to you and write to you now as an adult. When did the change happen? Slowly, I imagine…
I know that, over time, pain evolves into sorrow, and sorrow, in turn, increases the capacity for joy. I know that I have much to cherish in my life, yet I know that every hello may be the last and that every goodbye is as the first.
I have climbed my mountain, foot by foot, and passed through the tunnel at the top. My emotional landscape has been varied. I have followed seemingly endless narrow canyons, winding alone in shadow, thousands of feet below the sun plain. I have traversed barren deserts until I thirsted for relief, and, at times, I have sojourned in broad green valleys, building strength for the next challenge. The final stop is not listed on this trip—my journey is and has been my destination all along. No doubt, there will be other mountains, other canyons, other deserts, other valleys, and I will write to you about them. But, in the meantime, I have learned, and I have changed.
What is the shape of things to come? It’s a circle, like other circles in my life, centered in the twilight between what is felt and what is merely known, and with a diameter measured in years, not in yards. Through it all, I have found that I have learned what, deep down, I have always known. I have arrived at the place where, deep down, I have always been.
All these years, I have sought truth, hoping it would bring me peace, and I have sought peace, hoping it would help me to deal with the truth. Yet, I have been looking in
all the wrong places, and while I was looking outside myself, I was unconsciously finding both within.
For the truth is well concealed in the center of all being that is in each of us. It camouflages itself by hiding in the open, where few would think to look, but I, well, I am one of the lucky ones. I have discovered it at last. It’s a glimpse of play out an open window, a knowing smile at bedtime, a sleepy head resting on a shoulder, a sigh of contentment, a cheerful wave hello. It’s a moment of warmth, a secret shared breathlessly, a casual glance that says nothing in particular, but says all. It’s a quick impression, a flash of pride, a stolen hug, a silent tear. It is a thousand, thousand such moments, each of them a heartbeat, all of them a lifetime. It is what we were to each other. It is what we are to each other. It is all that happened. It is all that didn’t.
And now? Well, I have struggled and despaired, and I have survived. I have risen and fallen and risen again. I am changed forever, since that afternoon in May, and that’s OK with me. I have held on long enough to be able to let go, and I have let go enough to find something real to hold on to.
And Andrew, this too, I know. I’m all right now…
Love always,
Dad
Thank you for paying me this short visit today. Remember, build those bridges between your worlds, outer and inner, and, by all means, choose life.
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