What I Am Learning About Grief, Part II

It’s been two whole weeks since Jack called me at 2:02 p.m., on Christmas Day, and left a message on my phone.  I don’t think Jack has ever called me before.  We’ve always kept track of each other through Mom and John.  Sometimes our paths crossed when visiting at Mom’s or Grandma’s at the same time.  For sure, our telephone conversations have been so rare that Jack felt he had to identify himself.  In his message, he said this is “Jack, Jack Edinger.”  As if I wouldn't know who "Jack" was!

His message was:  “Sorry to call you on Christmas, but I’ve got very bad news … something happened last night, Mom’s OK, but we need to talk to you.” 

I returned his call right away and, once he was sure that I could hear him, he got right to the point:  “Dad is dead.  Mike is dead.”  Then, as I listened to his steady voice recounting the awful events of the previous twenty-four hours, I struggled but could not find a single word to express my first thoughts.  The previous 24 hours were Christmas Eve and the first half of Christmas Day. 

One week ago, on New Year’s Day, was the funeral at First Baptist Church of Mount Airy.  The service was preceded by an hour of the family’s “receiving friends” in a separate room within the church known as the fireside room.  It actually took an hour and a half to greet all the friends and well-wishers who came by to use that opportunity to offer condolences and to tell us how they knew John.  At full strength, the family receiving line included Mom, Jack and Anne, Connie and me, Greg and Amy, Clara and Ellen, and Little Mike, Brandy, and Sophia.  My two year-old nephew, Max, worked the crowd.

It was interesting, to stand in such a line and greet a steady stream of people, most of whom I did not know, or did not know very well, who had something to say about John (and Mike, too; but mostly about John).  Some had worked with him when he operated his business in Dobson.  A few were neighbors.  Some were members of First Baptist who knew John as a church member.  Nearly all of his friends from his breakfast table at Ocie’s came.  (Jack and I had eaten breakfast with them Thursday and Friday; Greg also joined us on Friday).  There were distant relatives, some on John’s side of the family (which included our Aunt Zola, Grandmother Edinger’s youngest sister, whom I had never met before) and some came from Mom’s side (these had driven up from Richlands and surrounding areas, including Mom’s brother, my uncle Ernest and his wife Phyllis, whom I don’t think Mom had seen since Grandma Huffman’s funeral twelve years before.    There were closer relatives. My cousin, Gina drove from Raleigh.  Of course, my two remaining brothers, Greg and Jack, and their families, were there.  And there were even relatives from my father’s side of the family, in-laws to Mom during her first marriage.  Uncle Jimmy (who is deaf) and Aunt Lottie drove all the way from Wilmington.  They were the first through the line.  Mom had said to me as we approached the church that morning that she was going to do her best not to cry.  That lasted about five minutes, for when Aunt Lottie and Uncle Jimmy stepped forward, and the recognition of who they were swept across Mom’s face, she broke down in big sobs.

When the receiving of friends was complete, the ushers led the family into the sanctuary, to the first two rows of pews on the front left-hand side of the room.  All I remember of the rest of the crowd was that the room seemed quite full.  Facing the front, we could see the raised platform, where Pastor Gilbert sat, and the choir loft.  The organist played a selection of hymns.  Immediately in front of us was a Christmas tree, still decorated.  And at the center, on our level but immediately in front of the pulpit was an altar table bearing candles, some green plants or flowers, and two small white containers—John’s and Mike’s ashes.

The service seemed short.  Ellen sang, beautifully, It Is Well With My Soul.  Pastor Gilbert recounted many of the vignettes of John and Mike with which we as a family had supplied him a couple days before.  He then brought an appropriate message, we sang a hymn (In the Garden), and the service was over.  The family was then led into a sort of multipurpose area within the church, used for fellowship, in which was a small kitchen and several tables set up for dining.  Church members had prepared a meal for the family.  They served and cleaned and stayed with us until the last one departed.  It is always something that tugs at my heart strings whenever I am conscious of someone doing something for me purely out of compassion and the kindness of their own heart, especially if that someone is unknown to me, as these were.

We retired from the church to Mom’s house again, the center of all activity for the week.  More people came to visit.  Even more brought food.  Gradually, the visitors thinned out to just close family.  We snacked on the food that had been brought during the week and drank coffee and iced tea.

Next day, Connie and Sarah and I returned to our home in Augusta.  Our caravan of two cars made the four-hour trip in just about six.  It was hard to concentrate on driving, so we stopped often.  Sarah finally got about an hour ahead of us at the end, she was so anxious to get home.

But even at home, my thoughts were still in Mount Airy.   One of the things that strikes me in all this is how glaringly unimportant things become that previously were considered to be of great importance.  I worked four days this past week, for example, and accomplished absolutely nothing, for nothing seemed too terribly important.  I was bored with it all.  I hope that I wasn’t rude, but I shunned conversation all week, preferring to be occupied instead with my own thoughts, which revolved around John, Mike, Mom, the events of December 24^th, the funeral, people we met and talked to last week, even what the road looks like between Augusta and Mount Airy.

It’s been hard to get interested in anything.  Gradually, this is changing, but for the first few days, even eating was uninteresting.  Sleep was difficult because all I could do was imagine what had happened, based on the snippets of information that I had.  I would rise up in the night and pace the floor.  Nothing that I normally find interesting, reading, listening to a favorite CD, watching a favorite TV channel, work, surfing the net, nothing, nothing at all held any appeal whatsoever.

As time passes, however, thoughts slowly begin to turn from what happened to is likely to happen.  Most thoughts like these concern my family, my mother, where will she stay, what can I do, how can I help Jack?  And then I see something that reminds me of John, a burgundy Lincoln town car, for example, (For a week, every town car I saw was burgundy, at least in my imagination, and John was driving it) or a restaurant that serves breakfast.  The bath towels Mom gave me, the ones emblazoned with UNC’s logo, remind me of Mike.

This is what I am learning.  I suppose that grief is like a wound to the flesh.  There is the initial blow.  Then doctoring and medications are applied.  Perhaps bandages or implements are necessary until the wound begins to heal.  You have to exercise the wounded limb.  Every so often, in spite of the best care taken, the injured place is hurt again, and pain is experienced afresh.  Time must pass for full healing to take place.  As to how much time, I suppose it varies according to the person and the seriousness of the wound.

Grief is a wound to the heart.  Initially, it’s like having the wind knocked out of your soul.  It hurts there just like a cut or a broken bone.  It’s different from a wound to the flesh in that, in the outward appearance, you may look just fine.  The hurt is on the inside.  An exterior wound draws forth compassion from friends, from family, even from sympathetic strangers.  A wound to the heart, being unseen by these, is therefore mostly unnoticed, except by a few.  This can make the hurt seem worse.  If all that be so, then just as surely, I think, as God has made the body capable of healing itself, or of being healed by the right treatments, a broken heart surely must be healable in the same manner.  Both require time, patience, carefulness, and attention to the right remedies. 

Toward the end of the healing process, there are often noticeable effects left in the body of a wound to the flesh—a limp, a scar, or a permanent weakness in some limb or muscle.  These are permanent reminders of what happened.  Warnings they are as to what can happen.  It is the same, I think, with the heart.  Eventually, the broken heart recovers.  But there may always be a spiritual scar, or limp, a favoring of one side or the other, in the inner man.  These bring with them no additional hurt, but they are reminders, to the thoughts and intents of the heart, of what happened and, if one is not careful, of what could happen again.  But the most important thing in these things, these reminders of previous hurt, is that they do not themselves hurt.  Moreover, they signal that the original hurt is long past, not to be felt any more.  And this testifies, more than anything, that God is good, very good indeed, to us.

Still, that loathsome impatience in us (a trait imbedded deep within our wretched human nature), is anxious to see that time pass and pass more quickly.  We need the eye of faith, to see beyond time, to behold and know that in His time, God makes everything beautiful (Eccl 3: 11), and works everything for the good of them that love him and that are called according to his purpose (Rom 8:28).  It’s not just time alone that heals: it’s time and God, and mostly God; no, it’s only God.