The best thing about funerals is that they cause you to reflect and realize what is truly important and what is trivial and distracting. Last weekend I attended the graveside service for my niece's baby, who did not survive his emergency C-section delivery. Carter was perfect - almost 9 pounds with thick auburn hair. His heart just inexplicably stopped. Watching these two brand new parents tucking their sweet baby in for the first and last time was heartbreaking. But seeing the love and support from their friends and family, letting words and impressions of comfort wash over them, and hearing beautiful music helped me focus on how important our relationships are. They sustain us and bring us hope and joy.
We released a flock of white balloons from the cemetery to join the two red ones released by his parents and watched them dance and float toward the blue sky opening in the gray clouds. Nothing else was important in that moment. Just watching the colors get smaller and smaller. The symbolism of the sun breaking through the rain. Watching Lorianne and Cameron cling to each other, uniting unspeakable grief with incomprehensible hope. We need each other. We don't need much of anything else.
Although funerals are extremely sad, I do love how well they remind us of what is truly important in life. There's a poem called "The Dash" by Linda Ellis that explains how the dates of when we were born and when we died aren't as important as the dash that separates them, or the time we spent living our lives.
ReplyDeleteThat poem was read by a friend at the funeral I attended over the weekend. it became my favorite, it's an amazing poem and made me realize so much.
DeleteI just recently went to a funeral last saturday for a freidn of mine. It taught me that you never know when life can be taken from you. When someone you love could be gone just like that. When I was at the funeral all I could think about was the fact that she was only 17 years old, and she lost out on the rest of her life. So many things to experience, so many years to live, all gone in a moment. And seeing her boyfriend there was one of the hardest parts. Imagining a blooming love being cut short. It was hard for me to think about being in love and then one day them being gone like that. Then right before they put her casket in the ground, her mom told her little brother (who was only about 4) to say bye to her, and he walked up to the casket by her head, kissed it and said bye sissy. I definitely started balling. I mean, how do you tell him she's gone? That seems so impossible.
ReplyDeleteThat would be the hardest thing to ever have to do. I cannot imagine being put through that pain but I do agree that it makes you remember what is important in life and what you should be living for.
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