How do you do it?
It's a question I've been getting from time to time recently, and I'm sure I'll get more and more in the coming year. I know I got it last time. Sometimes it's phrased that way, other times it's "I couldn't do it," or "I don't know you can do this." Sometimes I brush it off with a joke-- "oh, it's not so bad," but when I feel like engaging in a serious conversation, I usually just say, "You do what you have to do."
That's the way I feel about all this. If you'd asked me a few years ago if I would be able to deal with Jesse being away for months at a time, to say nothing of a year, I would have said "no." If you'd asked me if I was strong enough to live through him going to war, I wouldn't have been sure. It's something that seems impossible. It's a heartache that seems like it would be unbearable. And at times, it almost is ... but really, most of the time, you really do just "do what you have to do." A day is still a day, and you have to get up and live your life. I did it last time, and I'll be doing it this time.
Not surprisingly, C.S. Lewis puts it better than I do ... I started reading "A Grief Observed" last night ... I've had a copy for a long time, and just picked it up. It's a beautiful book -- I love how honest it is! He doesn't hide his doubts, his questions--even the hard ones. He just lays it all out there. Of course the fact that it was a journal has something to do with that, but still ... the fact that this man, who spent much of his life building incredible defenses of his faith, still questioned basic things like God's goodness during the most difficult time of his life, is incredible to me. It's encouraging to know that even someone like that is unsure sometimes, and has questions that seem unanswerable sometimes.
Anyway, as I read last night, parts of the book really resonated with me-- some of the emotions and reactions he described are similar to the ones I'm feeling now--on a smaller scale, of course, because I fully expect to be reunited with Jesse at the end of this year--but still similar. The emptiness and strangeness of suddenly having the one thing that means the most to you cut off is similar. I actually got out a pen and started underlining as I read-- I never do that!
But I said that he'd said it better than I did ...
"One never meets just Cancer, or War, or Unhappiness (or Happiness). One only meets each hour or moment that comes. All manner of ups and downs. Many bad spots in our best times, many good ones in our worst. One never gets the total impact of what we call "the thing itself." But we call it wrongly. The thing itself is simply all these ups and downs: the rest is a name or an idea."
That's the way I feel about all this. If you'd asked me a few years ago if I would be able to deal with Jesse being away for months at a time, to say nothing of a year, I would have said "no." If you'd asked me if I was strong enough to live through him going to war, I wouldn't have been sure. It's something that seems impossible. It's a heartache that seems like it would be unbearable. And at times, it almost is ... but really, most of the time, you really do just "do what you have to do." A day is still a day, and you have to get up and live your life. I did it last time, and I'll be doing it this time.
Not surprisingly, C.S. Lewis puts it better than I do ... I started reading "A Grief Observed" last night ... I've had a copy for a long time, and just picked it up. It's a beautiful book -- I love how honest it is! He doesn't hide his doubts, his questions--even the hard ones. He just lays it all out there. Of course the fact that it was a journal has something to do with that, but still ... the fact that this man, who spent much of his life building incredible defenses of his faith, still questioned basic things like God's goodness during the most difficult time of his life, is incredible to me. It's encouraging to know that even someone like that is unsure sometimes, and has questions that seem unanswerable sometimes.
Anyway, as I read last night, parts of the book really resonated with me-- some of the emotions and reactions he described are similar to the ones I'm feeling now--on a smaller scale, of course, because I fully expect to be reunited with Jesse at the end of this year--but still similar. The emptiness and strangeness of suddenly having the one thing that means the most to you cut off is similar. I actually got out a pen and started underlining as I read-- I never do that!
But I said that he'd said it better than I did ...
"One never meets just Cancer, or War, or Unhappiness (or Happiness). One only meets each hour or moment that comes. All manner of ups and downs. Many bad spots in our best times, many good ones in our worst. One never gets the total impact of what we call "the thing itself." But we call it wrongly. The thing itself is simply all these ups and downs: the rest is a name or an idea."
posted by Rebekah at 11:35 AM
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