It's been a hard week.
Okay, I am lying. It's been a hard couple of months.
Did you ever stop to wonder, when did it get so hard? When, exactly, did life start to wear you down? And then you look at yourself and wonder how you ever got to be where you are right then. I don't think I am alone in that. Sometimes I can't figure out which is more surprising; where we've wound up, or how we got there. It could always be worse. I hate that, how people say it could be worse, harder, etc. Some people (including myself) know that all too well. That doesn't make it less challenging.
I work in a birth setting, which is interesting. It's not all ponies and rainbows and unicorns (shocker). Sometimes it is, but sometimes it is sad and heartbreaking. Like when someone loses a child. I've had a couple of these recently, and while it is an honor, it also tugs at your heartstrings. It is an honor, because if you know for sure that you've experienced what will be one of the worst days of your life, you can only imagine what this might feel like. To get to be there, and maybe help in some small way, is an honor. If, through your own pain and suffering, you can empathize and absorb some of that person's pain and grief, you have a purpose. A couple of weeks ago I sat holding someone for twenty minutes in a bathroom while she experienced the worst day of her life, and I was pretty powerless. All I could do was hold her, tell her she wasn't alone, and that I wasn't leaving. Anybody who has ever heard the screams that come from a mom who has lost her child know that it's the worst sound in the world, one that cuts straight to your insides and makes you wonder what kind of God would make parents lose kids and genocides and suffering and about a thousand other things that make absolutely no rational sense whatsoever. I once read something that really resonated with me, that gave me purpose for my life and made me think about what I wanted to pass on. It's by Robert Fulghum, and I will quote it here:
(from a philosophy teacher, when asked what was the meaning of life)~
" When I was a small child, during the war, we were very poor and lived in a remote village. One day, on the road, I found broken pieces of a mirror. A German motorcycle had been wrecked in that place. I tried to find all the pieces and put them together, but it was not possible, so I kept only the largest piece. This one, by scratching it on a stone, I made round. I began to play with it as a toy and became fascinated by the fact that I could reflect light into dark places where the sun could never shine- in deep holes and dark closets and crevices. It became a game for me to get light into the most inaccessible places I could find. I kept the little mirror and, as I went about growing up, I would take it out in idle moments and continue the challenge of the game. As I became a man, I began to understand that this was not just a child's game but a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came to understand that I am not the light or the source of light. But light- Truth, understanding, knowledge- is there, and it will shine in many dark places if I only reflect it.
I am a fragment of a mirror whose whole design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have I can reflect light into the dark places of this world- into the black places in the hearts of men- and change some things in some people. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life."
This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my dear friends and family, who support me and hold me up when I fear I can't do it on my own. Who stand by my side and never leave, even in the darkest hours. Even when I don't like myself very much. Who listen and let me cry, hug and hold, empathize and don't minimize. I hope that, whether professionally or personally, I have been able to do that for someone. To absorb a little bit of their pain with an understanding heart, one that has been there too and knows. One that will listen and never judge. This is the meaning of MY life.
