Wednesday's Woe - How Do You Celebrate Life... Amidst Death?

Wednesday's Woe

How Do You Celebrate

Life...

Amidst Death?

Going through holidays seems doubly depressive. Going through a child's birthday, I KNOW I am so different than years before, and I get depressed at the loss of myself, the loss of who I once was on their birthdays. And then on top of that, I have the realization that THEY KNOW I am so different, when their day is not made as special as it once was, if at all!

Ah, the conflict of one of our child's birthdays approaching - it conjures up anxiety and dread... On the one hand, I'd like to be able to celebrate, but on the other hand, I don't know if I can even get through it!!! And on this past weekend, with this son, my birthday boy, being from out of town, it's not like, "Can we do this on a different day this time?" because he is in from out of town, and has to get back to go back to work... Pressure's on, but I still have nothing to give...

Now, add to all this tension, this same son comes in the door telling me how already, I have done "it" wrong, and his feelings have been hurt, so our visit has hardly even gotten off the ground and I already feel like a complete failure before I even start. Welcome to the "Happy Birthday" weekend, or really, "day" because he saved us for last after already celebrating with his friends in another city. (Thank goodness he did have some place to actually celebrate!)

Well, as you might imagine, it did not go well. We had to take time to get out all our frustrations and hurts first, and then our hearts melted into one another's, all of us realizing that coming off a week where one child's very life was threatened with having just found out he had cancer (the exact same cancer mind you, that TOOK my own brother's life), AND having to have the surgery to remove said cancer all in the same week. We were all a mess, and is it any wonder?

Trying to celebrate a life while a death was breathing down another one's neck was really quite the challenge. So, a good talk once nerves were settled, and we came to new understandings about one another, and our love and care were deepened for one another. Once again, God provides in an otherwise unwieldy impasse!!!

But oh, the turmoil that gets stirred up when we are all just trying to love one another really! It's sad; it's just incredibly sad. My birthday son's hypervigilance was stirred up in worrying about his brother, and it seems we already tread lightly on this earth hoping we won't lose anybody else, and then death seems to stare you in the face.

All quite the trappings for a horrific weekend, but we were able to love one another through it. Could a non-griever ever begin to imagine such nightmares as we face on any given day, even one as typically festive as a person's birthday would be?

I think not!

Pictures, thanks to FotoSearch