Hi Sarah,

I am so sorry to read about your brother’s tragic death. What a terrible, unexpected and stupid loss. I truly admire you for reaching beyond the pain, the grief, the hole he has left to search for a compassionate, empathetic way to live your life. That’s a choice and a hard one but one that will bring you peace, memorialize your brother and make this process of going across better for us all.

The wedding I will attend is next month so I will let you know later how I felt, if I may. When I responded to alto’s moving story, I was surprised that I mentioned the wedding. I had been trying on dresses the afternoon when I received a text that my cousin was on life support. While I knew he was losing his fight with cancer, that text hit me hard. I suddenly couldn’t stand the lace, the silk and tulle, the measuring for alterations: everything seemed frivolous, unimportant and not just the dresses. So I left.

As I wrote that night in response to alto’s story, the crazy juxtaposition struck my gut. We are born, we die. We marry, we bury. And the in-between, the going across is all paradox.

The human heart is resilient, thankfully, but our journey can seem ridiculous. I was angry about the wedding, the timing, yet I will celebrate the innocence if new beginning, the hope of their new life and I will cry that they will suffer. We all do.

Without hope and joy, I suspect none of us would choose to go on. I am grateful for both, even grateful for the lessons of dying, death, grief and all the tragedies life brings. I hope I always have the strength to reach for the wisdom all of life’s tragedies, joys and even its mundane moments bring.

I hate to feel pain. I fight it. Until I don’t and begin to learn from it. I respect that some, most, of the most transforming of life’s lessons are taught by pain. Paradoxically, those lessons have taught me to hope. And have transformed my heart unto something more open, forgiving and empathetic making all the hurt worthwhile. But only after I process it fully, facing the rage, denial, guilt and all else. Years later, I find I am grateful for it all. Life is bigger than we can know while living it.

My cousin entered palliative care yesterday. My heart is much more at peace. The text upset me most, to be honest, because I wrestled with “life support” fearing something ugly and prolonged. It seemed very unlike him or his wife, unlike a choice they’d make. Already upset that life takes so many of our choices, expectations and plans away without notice, I felt hurt he was losing the freedom of dying in peace and with presence. It turns out that he was never placed on life support, just offered it. Palliative care is another choice and it will end as life support would have ended, of course, but knowing that his choice is being respected means everything to me. We may have little control going across but/so respect is something each of us are due. The lesson isn’t in the coming in or the going out but in the choices we make going across.

Thanks for sharing your story, Sarah. It is a tough one to read but also a beautiful one because you found that “I know too much, now, about what can happen to people. It makes moments of happiness and beauty that much more precious.” I honor your honesty and self reflection.

Knowing too much has taught you a freeing lesson: “I am working on living those moments fully, trying not to let the cloud of the possible future pass over the golden sun of the present.” I’m in awe of the wisdom of your heart.

May you find peace as you reconcile the unreconcilable. And I’ll let you know how I feel after the wedding. Your story has opened me to feeling something profound. Thank you.

Colette