Tag Archives: Love

For Those Who Mourn

Several of my dearest friends have lost loved ones recently; other friends have faced difficult anniversaries of loss. This has been an especially challenging time for many of my favorite people. I want to send special love and thoughts of support and hope to all of you who have suffered great losses recently, or who lost loved ones or relationships some time ago but still feel the sting of those losses every day.

Even after estrangements or difficulties, or when death is expected, such losses can be extremely difficult and sometimes surprisingly destabilizing to our mental and physical health. Even if a friend or family member was challenging, or if we were no longer close, facing their deaths usually makes our own lives feel more fragile. We can also feel as if we’ve lost a part of our own histories when they leave this world. When we lose another person (or an animal friend) who has witnessed important times in our lives, we may feel as if we’ve lost those times forever, and given up a part of ourselves, too.

But we still carry those people, companions and experiences in our hearts, and our relationships with them don’t die when their bodies stop breathing. Our relationships can even grow over time as we gain new insights into their behaviors or their pains or fears. We may grow to forgive, or even to get angrier for them for the way they behaved—and that’s okay. It takes time to process and understand relationships and feelings. We may even think we’ve finished grieving for them and find that a wave of great sadness and loss overcomes us at strange times, scaring us with the strength of our emotions. That is normal, too.

If you have suffered a great loss and the weight of it is still heavy or the pain feels very fresh, I am so sorry. Though time does ease it, getting to a point at which memories feel more pleasurable than painful can take much longer than we expect, and working through grief is exhausting. For now, I hope you will ask less of yourself for the time being, while your suffering is fresh. The stress of grief is one of the greatest stresses a body can bear, so allow yourself time to rest and recover from the shock of loss. Treat yourself as you would treat any dear friend who was in pain—with extra sleep, nurturing food, enough quiet time, and, when necessary, comforting distractions. Emotional breaks are important, and finding moments of lightness or laughter during times of grief does not make you disloyal to those whom you have lost. There is no timetable that you must follow in order to be “normal” or “right”—take your time, get your rest, and don’t feel guilty if you need extra time away from others, or if you can’t respond to others’ kindnesses as quickly as you’d like.

Remember that you are loved, and that those whom you love don’t disappear from your life as long as you carry them with you in your heart. Sharing what you love most about them with others can be healing, and it can pass their goodness along to others; I still speak of my grandmother’s love and grace frequently, and it comforts me and makes my daughter feel close to Grandma Emma, even though they never met.

You are not any less valuable or lovable just because those who have loved you deeply are no longer near you. You will always matter, and so will they.

 

Photo by Mike Labrum, Unsplash

The Least of These

Boxing Day illustration by George Cruikshank (1792-1878), the British caricaturist and book illustrator best known for illustrating the works of his friend Charles Dickens.

Today is Boxing Day, a day traditionally set aside to remind those who have been blessed with comfort to share their bounty with those to whom life has been less generous. The tradition seems to have begun in the 1600s in England when the more well-to-do put together boxes of money, gifts, hand-me-downs and leftover food for their servants who had worked on Christmas Day. These servants were given the day after Christmas off to spend with their families and enjoy the contents of the box.

One of the central tenets of the religion which takes Jesus as its lord is expressed in the following passage from the New Testament’s Book of Matthew:  “‘For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’ They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’ He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’’

The true character of a human being is shown in the way that she or he treats those who are in need, those who are suffering, those who have no power. People of character don’t spend time determining that some people are unworthy of human decency. The Jesus lauded as the redeemer of Christians did not trample on the weak or crush those who had erred. He saw no poor as “undeserving,” nor did he believe that some prisoners deserved kindness while others deserved a boot in the face. Jesus said that the way to show reverence for that which was pure and good was to show reverence for and generosity to “the least of these”—those most degraded, despised, troubled and troubling people among us. He said we should focus more of our love, mercy and understanding on these people than on the fortunate few. His concern was not with the inhabitants of any shining city on a hill; he saved his blessings (and, Christians say, his miracles) for those who had the least and needed love most.

We can celebrate the spirit of Boxing Day without using boxes; just choose a favorite charity or two and help them to help others, or do a good deed for someone in need. In the spirit of Boxing Day, I’m giving to my local food bank today. If you’re looking for an especially effective nonprofit to support with your Christmas cash, Hanukkah gelt or secular humanistic savings, CharityNavigator.com is a great place to start.

Blessed are the merciful. Peace be with you today and throughout the new year.

Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds Admit Impediments

Laura Pride

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.

—from Sonnet 116 by William Shakespeare

All year long, I’ve anxiously and hopefully awaited the Supreme Court’s decision on the question of marriage equality, wondering every day for months whether they would do the just and proper thing by all LGBTQ citizens of the United States at last. This week, as the nation awaited the decision with bated breath, I hoped that the answer would come on Friday, June 26, since that was my late mother’s birthday, and I could think of no greater honor to her memory than to have a landmark civil rights decision giving millions of people financial, emotional, legal and medical protection be announced on her natal day. On Friday, my dream came true.

I’m a straight woman who has already been afforded all the benefits of legal marriage more than once. I have never had to worry that a partner would be excluded from my hospital room, disallowed from taking custody of our child in an emergency, denied inheritance rights or social security or medical benefits, or publicly humiliated, shunned and mocked for calling himself my partner without benefit of marriage. I have lived a privileged life because I happened to be born with the prevailing sexual orientation during a time and in a place in which I could choose my partner of my own volition without being abused, threatened or punished for my orientation or my choices. But while I am heterosexual, I also cherish a number of gay, lesbian, bisexual and trans friends and family members, and my life would be pale and hollow without them. Since childhood, many, at times most, of my nearest and dearest have been and continue to be homosexual or bisexual men and women. They always will be. To watch them be denied basic honor, dignity, respect and rights because of their orientation has sickened and disturbed me since I was a girl, and I have been a devoted ally to my darling LGBTQ loved ones (and to all the millions of LGBTQ strangers out there) for decades.

I cried with joy and relief early on Friday morning when I read the news minutes after the decision was announced, and I look forward to shedding more tears of joy at the weddings and anniversaries of my friends for decades to come. The world is so much brighter, fairer and more hopeful each time we extend justice and equality to those who have been denied it. We are so lucky to be alive to witness this beautiful day.