Mortality

"Give all of us gathered here tonight the strength to remember that life is so very fragile.  We are all vulnerable and we will all, in some point in our lives.....fall.  We will all fall.  We must carry this in our hearts; that what we have is special, that it can be taken from us.  And that when it is taken from us, we will be tested; we will be tested to our very souls.  We will now all be tested.  It is these times, it is this pain, that allows us to look inside ourselves."

These thoughts were going through my mind Tuesday morning as I closed the door to drive to work.  I was leaving the hospital; my wife, her dad, and her brother were with her mom.  Late last night we got a call and from the beginning it was clear that something was wrong, very wrong.

But the sentiment above really started coming on strong over the last couple weeks, maybe longer….

I suppose it really started in the middle of August.  My wife was headed in for hernia surgery, her mom was going to take her and I was going to stay home with our children.  This sounded like a great plan until the night before her surgery; I was worried about her and not being there with her.  In that moment I recognized how fragile life can be and how infrequently I stop to think about it.

She went in for surgery and before we knew it she was home. 

Then in September my mom visited for our oldest son’s 5^th birthday.  A great time was had by all.

Not long after she got home she got sick, very sick.  She had bacterial meningitis.  Immediately we were worried about her and worried about any potential exposure risks for our children.  Thankfully everything was fine, but we paid a heavy price in terms of worry and overall stress.  Once again all of this was centered on just how fragile life is, and how dearly we want to protect it.

Fast forward to just a couple of weeks ago and our son was lying down with my wife for bedtime.  He started to ask her how many birthdays he would have, then it turned in to how old would he be when he dies, then it became tear filled eyes saying he was scared of dying.  This little man is 5 years old and already he is working out the complexities of life.  We’ve had several very open conversations about death, and about how he need not worry about things like this.  While that is a convenient answer for us to give, he is still working out these things.  I couldn’t help but recognize the depth of the inner world inside him.  Once again the fragility of life is the topic, answers are fleeting at best.  The only real answer being that we’re all afraid of dying, so afraid that we rarely even mention it, because doing so would acknowledge just how powerful that fear is; recognizing just how fragile life is.

Then the phone rang last night, as my mother in law fought through tears to speak, I handed the phone to my wife.  A few minutes later she was headed to the hospital; her mom had suffered a heart attack.  Thankfully this morning she got a stent implanted to alleviate her blocked artery.  As I type this we are all in full appreciation of just how fragile life is, just how sacred life is, and how special what we all have is.

"Give all of us gathered here tonight the strength to remember that life is so very fragile.  We are all vulnerable and we will all, in some point in our lives.....fall.  We will all fall.  We must carry this in our hearts; that what we have is special, that it can be taken from us.  And that when it is taken from us, we will be tested; we will be tested to our very souls.  We will now all be tested.  It is these times; it is this pain that allows us to look inside ourselves."