But a Moment in Time
Last night in the last moments before sleep carried me away my son came to me. He hugged me and had anguish in his voice. It was a deep sadness and while I could not see his eyes I felt they were filled with tears.
"I will never see Greg sitting in his living room again Pop."
I immediately knew what he was talking about. Greg was the husband for one year of a woman who lives one house up the street. He married the divorced mother of one of Noah's best friends and was the owner of his own landscaping company. He was only in his early 50's and seemed to be filling a void in the lives of his three step children. He must have brought stability to their house again. The sense of permanence that children long for. In the mornings I would see him preparing for the work day with a Mexican he employed. In the afternoons he would be outside playing basketball or throwing a football with one of the boys. Last May he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. When I heard the news realism kicked in. It was the same deadly disease my mother battled with and lost in a short fight. I told my son he would be dead in less than a year. It came out kind of callously but I didn't mean it that way. It was simply me being honest with myself.
When a person receives a terminal diagnosis they are likely the most realistic of all. Everyone around them is filled with false hope. It is a psychological way of coping. Why confront today what you can put off until tomorrow? It is a fundamental human trait both intellectually and physically. Meanwhile, the person that is sick knows that they must treat every minute of life as if it was the last. There is nothing more immediate as the end of life itself.
Those around Greg hoped for the best while he took the chemo drip of death. While some cancers can be fought, cancer of the pancreas is as deadly as a freight train barreling down a track. An optimistic diagnosis for my mother with chemo was 9 months. That is exactly what she and Greg lasted.
A young child is new in this world. Everything around them is new. It is like the day you unwrap the latest electronic device. It seems so modern, so up to the moment. The height of technology. A few years later it starts to seem antiquated and a few more it is obsolete. For a child death is a distant concept. It almost seems unreal. The only connection they have is the death of a pet yet still, that seems oddly disconnected to human life.
I remember as a child when my grandfather died. He had brain cancer and when I visited him he was wheel chair bound and had paper thin skin. He seemed almost alien in the transformation from health to sickness that had consumed him. I remembered him healthy, chasing me around the house holding his dentures. Throwing a baseball to me in the yard. Suddenly all that was gone. He was old, sick and withered, it didn't seem right. As life progresses we see family members die and friends depart. The experience only serves to remind us of our own mortality. Each brings about its own pain and feelings of regret. Each leaves a hole in our life and a scar on our heart.
Learning about death is a part of life and accepting it is never easy. I wish I knew how to explain this to the innocent child so void of such loss. I wish I had a magic formula of words to help the heart or sooth the pain but in truth there is none. Loss is forever. I hugged Noah and told him that if anything, losing Greg is a lesson on how we must value every day of life. Being alive is a gift and we should try not to waste it. I told him it is okay to be sad, if we were not, we would never understand loss. In life there is pain. Perhaps it is the very same pain that should serve to remind us of all that we have.
Death is part of life and it hurts but if we truly want to honor the dead, we should never forget what we lost.
"I will never see Greg sitting in his living room again Pop."
I immediately knew what he was talking about. Greg was the husband for one year of a woman who lives one house up the street. He married the divorced mother of one of Noah's best friends and was the owner of his own landscaping company. He was only in his early 50's and seemed to be filling a void in the lives of his three step children. He must have brought stability to their house again. The sense of permanence that children long for. In the mornings I would see him preparing for the work day with a Mexican he employed. In the afternoons he would be outside playing basketball or throwing a football with one of the boys. Last May he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. When I heard the news realism kicked in. It was the same deadly disease my mother battled with and lost in a short fight. I told my son he would be dead in less than a year. It came out kind of callously but I didn't mean it that way. It was simply me being honest with myself. When a person receives a terminal diagnosis they are likely the most realistic of all. Everyone around them is filled with false hope. It is a psychological way of coping. Why confront today what you can put off until tomorrow? It is a fundamental human trait both intellectually and physically. Meanwhile, the person that is sick knows that they must treat every minute of life as if it was the last. There is nothing more immediate as the end of life itself.
Those around Greg hoped for the best while he took the chemo drip of death. While some cancers can be fought, cancer of the pancreas is as deadly as a freight train barreling down a track. An optimistic diagnosis for my mother with chemo was 9 months. That is exactly what she and Greg lasted.
A young child is new in this world. Everything around them is new. It is like the day you unwrap the latest electronic device. It seems so modern, so up to the moment. The height of technology. A few years later it starts to seem antiquated and a few more it is obsolete. For a child death is a distant concept. It almost seems unreal. The only connection they have is the death of a pet yet still, that seems oddly disconnected to human life.
I remember as a child when my grandfather died. He had brain cancer and when I visited him he was wheel chair bound and had paper thin skin. He seemed almost alien in the transformation from health to sickness that had consumed him. I remembered him healthy, chasing me around the house holding his dentures. Throwing a baseball to me in the yard. Suddenly all that was gone. He was old, sick and withered, it didn't seem right. As life progresses we see family members die and friends depart. The experience only serves to remind us of our own mortality. Each brings about its own pain and feelings of regret. Each leaves a hole in our life and a scar on our heart.
Learning about death is a part of life and accepting it is never easy. I wish I knew how to explain this to the innocent child so void of such loss. I wish I had a magic formula of words to help the heart or sooth the pain but in truth there is none. Loss is forever. I hugged Noah and told him that if anything, losing Greg is a lesson on how we must value every day of life. Being alive is a gift and we should try not to waste it. I told him it is okay to be sad, if we were not, we would never understand loss. In life there is pain. Perhaps it is the very same pain that should serve to remind us of all that we have.
Death is part of life and it hurts but if we truly want to honor the dead, we should never forget what we lost.
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