Thursday, May 19, 2011

Broken, Part 1

I was sitting with a friend when we spied her across the crowded room. We both called to her but she had her back partially turned to us and didn't hear. I charged over and dragged her back to our table.

We talked and laughed. We caught up with each other - how busy we had all been, one of us with her career, one of us with her calling, one of us with her causes. The friend I was with originally had to leave; we vowed that somehow we would all get together this summer.

The remaining two of us kept chatting lightly. Yes, I was still happy at Carswell and thankful for the opportunities I received from working at this amazing company. No, she had given up most of her volunteering - moving to a new, larger, home had taken any extra energy she had had to spare.

"How's your son?" I asked brightly.

She became utterly still. Haltingly, through suddenly frozen lips, came the words no mother wants to have to hear herself say.

"He ... died six months ago."

Then she simply stood there in front of me, trembling slightly, so little, so alone, as I stared at her in disbelief. Her blue eyes pleaded with me silently as if asking me to tell her it was just a dream, it was only a bad dream, that she could wake up now.

And silently I opened my arms and she stepped into my fierce embrace and began to shake.

We clung together in the middle of that bustling hall and slowly words started to emerge. Massive heart attack ... fiancee hadn't heard from him ... hotel security ... too late  ... all alone.

"I can't tell people yet. Only a few people ... I haven't unpacked in my new place yet. It seems so unimportant when living itself seems so unimportant.

"I don't have anybody now. There's nothing to live for."

"There's you," I murmured. 

How did she get through Christmas? Through Mother's Day? I wondered to myself. How does she get up in the morning?

And during these next few days I have thought of other people for whom I care deeply: the daughter whose mother is fading away little by little in extended care, whose hands cling to hers on Mother's Day ...

The six-year-old son who walks, all by himself, up to his father's coffin and gazes solemnly at the picture of the man whose absence will be such a prevailing force in his life ...

The man whose existence is threatened because of a blood clot the size of a pin prick ...

The frightened girl whose brother is assaulting her and whose mother turns a blind eye ...

The mother, 8 1/2 months pregnant, who stops by one morning to tell me that she is going to the funeral director to discuss the burial of her unborn son, who will die within the first few hours of his birth ...

The father, enmeshed with alcohol and despair, looking in an empty fridge for milk to pour on his kids' cereal ...

The devoted man who had buried his wife and has now found deep happiness with someone who is in turn devoted to him, but who occasionally weeps at the loss of what once was ...

The beautiful woman whom we all can see but who is still searching for herself ...

The sister who is punished for not punishing her father ...

The children who have had their families washed away by a wave that comes
for them every night in their dreams ...

The woman who started with a pain in her back just months ago and whose body is now for the most part confined to a wheelchair, bending over to sip wine through a straw ...

The son who comes upon his father's body, hanging heavy from a tree in the bend of the path ...

The man who works late into the night, struggling to find a way to pay his debts and provide for his family ...

The daughter who has been set adrift by the death of her mother, her anchor ...

The single mother whose beautiful, brittle son dances recklessly on the tightrope of his own life while she stands despairing guard below, knowing there will be no net broad enough to catch him should he fall ...

The woman who hears the dreaded C word - twice - and authorizes the carving up of her body to prevent the disease from coming back, from spreading ...

The man in limbo because his wife is here in body but has not been here in mind for almost two decades ...

The father who fights for the life of his perfect, oxygen-deprived daughter and finally, four years later, raises the white flag ...  

The friends who are no longer with us because the pain became too great ...

And this list is just a glimpse of the visible scars. What of the deep brokenness that dwells inside so many people who cross my path and to which I am oblivious?

What if I hadn't asked my friend about her son? When would she have been able to talk about this event that is decimating her very being?

God, give me the eyes of compassion and the ears of sensitivity and the words of comfort and the arms of shelter and the heart of Jesus, broken for me, for each one of these dearly beloved people whose lives intersect with mine.

(Thanks to Cathryn, full of Grace, for the gift of Over the Rhine's CD "The Long Surrender" and the beautiful song "All My Favorite People Are Broken", given to me moments after I had met with my friend.)

4 comments:

  1. oh karyn. no words. just tears and nodding and a whispered "yes".

    i love you so much...

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  2. I think your prayer at the end is one that each of us need to be praying. We're so wrapped up in our own lives and what we perceive as major problems in our lives. There are so many people, friends and family included, that are hurting and we're too busy to see it:(. Thank you for the reminder...

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  3. Thanks for this post Karyn, which I read very soon after hearing that my friend has finally received word from the police that they have positively identified his son's body, after 12 weeks waiting for the forensics to confirm what they already knew, but which they must now truly face. That last spark of hope has been doused and they must now bring their boy home and lay him to rest. I will be praying your prayer many times today.

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  4. I love the cd ~ I went to school with Linford...and I love that song in particular. It moved me to tears the first time I heard it a few months ago when another class mate posted it.

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