Season of Light and Dark

Tis the season, for our yearly reflection. On things past and things hoped for. For Peace, Goodwill, Joy and for many the time to reflect on their saviors birth, the miracles of Gods promise. It is the time of cold, dark, the shortest days, a season for going inward, retreat until the hint of spring and resurrection of all things green and of all things spiritual. Now we gather close to kith and kin, close to home and hearth and wait for the sun to re-warm our earth, our bodies and our spirits.I awoke again, unable to sleep~ so many ghosts around my bed. The dog is ill, may well be with us only for a few more days. I had to rise, felt the need to be near her and sort out my feelings. It is odd both of the dogs came to be with me late in their days, yet I feel connected with them in many ways. I am not sure who is the comforter and the comforted, but here I am on a dark morning quietly beside her. Waiting for another death, another passing.

I was thinking about people, as I often do .In general the kind of people, the ones who look and do, perhaps beyond the obvious, certainly beyond the ordinary. Specifically the ones who surrounded my loved ones as they died. The young drug counselor, who seeing my eldest as he crawled the city streets vainly trying to avoid death, looking for help, looking for~ God? Looked past what many would have thought~”hey he’s just a drunk, druggie” and called 911. To that ambulance crew who rushed to him, tried their very best to save a complete stranger. They too looked past anything and everything and saw only a man needing help, help that came too late, but help that eased his mothers heart. I wrote to the ambulance company to thank them for their help, for what they do with their lives. By the startled responses I got, praise must not be a common reaction. Praise is what they deserve for what must be a heart-wrenching job, clearly one not thanked enough. I often think of the young counselor, after much confusion on the part of the supervisor, who was afraid of my reason for calling, I learned he was quite shaken by the experience, that he not only called but went out into the night to wait by my son till help came. I think of him often with much fondness, for one who cared so much for another human. I hope he soars; I hope his life is a blessed one.

My second son’s death is the hardest to write about, so forgive any disjointedness. The security guard, the first step in the ER triage, waved us on to wait; ignoring my feeble pleas, ~ I can never forget his eyes as they met mine on the way out the door after. I hope he has found peace, I hope he knows I forgive him. I know he realizes something precious was lost that day. I hope he knows each body is amazingly unique, that each who finds him or her self there deserves only the best. It is a high cost to pay, but one that any who works such jobs must pay. To the nurse who came in answer to my screams, to the other nurse who sat me down, holding my hand as they began to try to save him. To the administrator who asked if we would rather wait elsewhere. When I said no, I was going to stay close, the firm voice of another nurse saying, “I wouldn’t go anywhere else, either”~ another mother surely~ her voices echo’s still within me. When they found my other son had died just nine months before in the very same ER, the undercurrent changed, that information spreading as it only can in hospitals. Like wildfire and unspoken. The six or so nurse’s and doctors looked at me in unison and quickly turned back to re-new their efforts. For twenty minutes. To that nurse who when I said ,he is gone isn’t he, just looked at me~ I reassured her I could take and wanted the truth, then she just asked me if I wanted to say goodbye. As they stood around me I told my beloved I cared more for him than life, that he and gotten a bum deal from the get go and how sorry I was. How I loved him. They kept trying. I know what that job can cost those wonderful people, I know what it cost them that day as each of then hugged me, the mothers sobbing. The doctors feeling helpless. Their faces are a blur to me, but I often hope the best for each of them. To do what they do each day, the wondrous moment when a life is saved counter balanced by days such as mine…it takes a special soul to seek out that work. For however hardened one becomes~ make no mistake they must harden themselves to do such work~ a day comes along unbearably real and terrible that makes them question all. They have my undying gratitude, my hope for all that is best.

Each winter season that has passed brings these things back, each time the pain is brought out like some finely etched glass object, to be held in hand admired, awed by, cried over as it reflects it crystalline colors. It is an honor to have such pain, such joy, to have felt these very human emotions .To know breath and the absence of breath. To have loved so deeply and completely. To have achieved some level of peace. In this season, when we reflect on birth, death and resurrection, when we honor the cycle of light and dark, I hope we each see the divine that is all around us. Most importantly I hope we see the divine that is in us~ and its name is love. Blessed Be.