Loss

My Dad came from a generation that rarely shared emotions. I don’t recall him ever telling me, “I love you.” I remember he cried on three occasions – when his mother died, when Mom died, and when my brother had a stroke. His emotions did become more apparent in the last decade or so of his life, but that’s common with the ageing process. It has become a tradition in my family to mention the “Murray handshake” whenever it’s time for a hug. Even so, I know Dad loved me and my siblings.

There are dozens of ways to say, “I love you,” other than with those exact words: “Drive carefully, don’t hurry, call me when you’re on the way, be careful, work hard, do your best, you did a good job, I’ll make some calls for you, don’t worry about the money.” I heard all of these when I was growing up. When I was in a car accident – a speeding car rear-ended me and three of my friends on a Sunday morning – my dad rushed back from the golf course. I said, “I’m sorry the car got totaled.” He said, “Cars can be replaced. You can’t.” If that isn’t a way to say, “I love you,” I don’t know what is.

Dad died on July 13. We had a family gathering at graveside to remember him and Mom on September 16. I found some hopefully appropriate scriptures and poems to share. Several family members shared their memories. My sister reflected that she believed “time” is our enemy. In a way, I agree. Yet, I think the real enemy isn’t time, it’s our choices – the ways we choose to use our time. As usual, the enemy is us.

One of our family patterns was to reschedule birthdays and holidays to more convenient times. My wife has always had a problem with that. I admit, I see her point. When we wait to celebrate or get together as a family, time can slip away, and with it our chances to get together. We will never get together with Mom or Dad again in this life. Time just keeps flowing. And time is innocent, or at least oblivious to our choices. Maybe we need to listen more often to the little voice in our heads that says, “do this now – you may never get another chance.”

What hurts most about loss, other than missed opportunities, is that we know we can’t re-live all the beautiful moments when we felt loved and cared for. We may try to hold on to cookouts, pool parties, Christmases by the tree, building things with Dad, cooking things with Mom, carrying Dad’s golf clubs, helping mom move flower arrangements, seeing the pride in our parent’s eyes when they watched us play in band, and hundreds of more personal times, but in the end, all we have is our memories. Unless we can build a time-machine or collect a favor from the Ghost of Christmas Past, moments like these are no longer available to us.

When Albert Einstein lost his dear friend Michele Besso, he wrote a letter of condolence to Besso’s family. In it, he said, “Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That signifies nothing. For those of us who believe in physics, the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.” If information can never be destroyed, then all that our loved ones were is still here. We may not be able to access these precious moments, but they might continue to exist. If so, perhaps the spirit of our loved ones is closer than we think. These memories may transcend time and space. If God so loves us, all the good we have lost will one day be returned to us.