HOME | POLITICS | SPORTS | LIFE | SCI/TECH | OPEDS | HELPFUL TIPS
|
May 27, 2004 It would seem we all grieve, be it for a house we lived in for ten or twenty years, or a car we lost, or had to sell, or a marriage gone bad, even a dog or pet we loved so dear, die. Sometimes we even grieve schools we got to leave, for we often times go back to take a second look, do we not, somewhere down the road of life we surely do. Grieving is, or so I've been told, and learned: simply letting go. Being a 20-year counselor in this field, now retired, it is not new to me [for me, now that's another story]. We all grieve differently, some longer, some not so long. But again, the name of the game is to let go and go forward in life. It is what life is. I once heard a song as a kid when I was about 12-years old, up stairs with my brother, we slept in the attic back in those days, anyhow, Pat Boone sang the song and I remember it saying something to the effect [I will paraphrase it]: "now God didn't give you that [person], no, not by a hundred thousand miles, he just leant him to you for a while" something like that. Then you go on to war, as I did, or people do die, I should say [Vietnam; now the soldiers in Iraq will have to deal with this], and thus, for many the grieving process will start, for the families back home, and for the soldiers next to you: yes they have time and love and friendship invested in you, or him: and the closer you are the more you grieve [Like our Marines, and Special Forces, our Army Rangers, etc now coming home from battles won and lost] the human being that once walked and talked, and shred your space, no longer does. And the bequest - the inheritance of this sad moment will last a long, long time, and for some it will be a long road home. We grieve I heard because of the good times we had, not the bad, no one really wants to grieve I believe because of bad times, they want to bury them, but it is the sadness that makes us bow our heads to the floor with overwhelming emotions, and look up to visualize all the great little and big moments we had with this person, most being a complement of small moments, for believe it or not, the big ones come and go and are very sparse to say the least: they are not steady, the small ones are daily. Now you may be asking: he's talking about grieving, where is he going with this, and where does he want to end up. Well, for most of us older folks we have done our grieving, and the rest will be left for the younger generation: and for the older folks we have a few left, and that is it: like our recent singer Johnny Cash who passed on, his wife first, then he, I do believe the sadness killed him; but that is my belief, right or wrong. But in all the sadness, deaths, and counseling experiences, divorce, and a multitude of other grieving similarities, there was nothing as devastating as when my mother died: thus far. Someone asked me: when you think of her, is it negative? "No, oh no," I said, "I'm not mad at God, or her, or anybody," or so I try to tell them; they say this because I didn't smile for six-months after her death I suppose, otherwise why ask such questions. Or because I thought about her everyday for a year, an eyebrow may go up or down "this is letting go, not of her, but of the fact I can't have her back, her time was up, just like your time and my time will be up. And I suppose I could give a lot of "supposes," if I looked hard enough. But the plain fact is this: if you were married for a year, 12-months, you normally would grieve for 1-month, so the experts say, and tell the counselors to accept. Now if you are married for 27-years, you got about 3-years of recovery to deal with. Now I and my mother lived together off and on, for: 36-years, so I got [or had] a lot of grieving to do, wouldn't you say: according to the experts anyhow, four years to meet their expectations. But my point to be made is this: when people are grieving, ask them if there is anything you can do for them, no more, no less, let them know, you're there for them, and last and most important, let them grieve, they've got the right, they made the investment. Being sad is saying simply, it all was worthwhile having you in my life. ------------ About the author: Mr. Siluk is a world traveler, a lover of the mysteries around the world, and has visit many World Heritage Sites, the most recent being Easter Island and the Galapagos. His most recent book: "After Eve," and his 26th book thus far, can be seen on/at Barns and Nobel.com, Amazon.com, Walmart and several other sites. He spends his time between Lima, Peru and St. Paul, Minnesota, and is wroking on two more books: "Stay Down, Old Abram," and "Curse of the Abyss Worm," the second being a suspensful mystery. Visit http://dennissiluk.tripod.com Email: dlsiluk@msn.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ |
||||||
|
|
|||||||
|
