I randomly thought about this blog today and wondered if I could still access it. Turns out it's tied to Google, so I didn't even have to remember a password.
It looks like it's been 9 years since I posted something here. Per my last post (May of 2013), I was going to post again in a year. Whoops.
9 years seems both so long and so short. A lot has changed. Very little has stayed the same. The song comes to mind, "on Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand."
In May 2013, I was thinking about a truck. I'd like to go back in time and tell my younger self that in a few short months, he would have his truck, and it will serve him well (just be more careful when you're backing up in the Toyota parking lot).
In 2022, I'm still thinking about new trucks, but there are other concerns too.
In the intervening years, life has marched its inexorable march. The stories that could have been recorded here are legion.
- 5 years of marriage has become 14
- a kid has made her maniacal appearance
- grandparents have passed
- a brother has died
- health concerns have proven to be nothing
- and heath concerns have turned out to be devastating
- nieces and nephews have been born
- dogs and cats have come and gone
- homes have been bought and sold
- total career changes have been made
- churches have been joined and left
- friendships have been made and abandoned
- deer hunting has resumed
- storms literal and figurative have come and gone
One of the things most unsettling to me about death is the idea that all the memories unique to that person, all the experiences they had that no one else can ever see, are gone.
I think about that with my brother. His death is the most recent and unmooring of the list above. I haven't talked about my feelings with anyone but Anna.
I haven't wanted to say the word suicide. But it's not a secret. My parents very intentionally didn't disguise it in his obituary, and the pastor spoke about Christopher's mental illness at the funeral.
I haven't wanted to think about it too much at all for many reasons but especially because when I do, I start wondering about things to which I will never have an answer. I know he was homeless. I don't know why. I don't know how long (best guess is at least three years). We had no idea until after he died. He hid that from us. He must have hidden a lot of things. And all the answers have died with him. There was no note.
We can point to his "mental illness" as the cause for all of this, but we'll never know the full reality of that.
Is it possible to think about a preventable, untimely death, and not play the "what if" game? I have to fight to not go down that rabbit hole. But his death feels as though it was extra avoidable. He was a phone call away from help, and he couldn't bring himself to ask. All he had to do was call.
The night I found out, I hung up the phone with my parents and forced myself to sing the Doxology. Of course I didn't feel like singing, but I knew that if there was any sense to be made in any of this life, it has to come in the knowledge that there is a king and He is on the throne.
No comments:
Post a Comment