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The Connection Between Pain and Healing, Singing and Dying

Our brave little boy, pre-op.

Nearly two weeks ago, we went to a funeral for our friend’s father. We took Leo and Poppy along because the other kids were at school and no one was available to watch them. They are four years old and two years old. We sat in the very back row, and during the service they mostly colored and played with some toys we brought and asked how much longer it would be.

Although I was not directly related to the man who had died, the church was filled with my people–first and second cousins, aunts and uncles, great-aunts and great-uncles, close friends. Even though there were a few hundred people there, it would not have taken long to figure out how I was connected to nearly every person.

Maile leaned over and whispered into my ear, “There’s something really special about this community.” And she’s right. My ancestors have lived in this area for thirteen generations. I show up at gatherings and meet distant cousins I hadn’t met before. I feel connected to this place, this dirt, these fields and trees and churches and cemeteries.

In this community of Lancaster, death brings us together. Yes, we weep for those who have left us. Sometimes desperately. The sense of what has been lost can feel overwhelming. But when we come together to remember the person who has gone, and we sit there among so many generations, so many families, so many stories, there is a kind of healing that takes place. It is hard to explain, this aching wholeness.

The family whose father had died, they were a singing family, and at one point we all sang together.

I’ll fly away, oh glory
I’ll fly away in the morning
When I die, Hallelujah by and by
I’ll fly away

* * * * *

Later that night, I was putting Leo to bed, and he asked me if I was going to die.

“Probably not today. But we all die someday,” I told him quietly. It is hard to look at a four-year-old and imagine that this is true.

“But what happens when we die?” he asked, his voice tremulous, afraid to explore this new ground but helpless to turn away from his own curiosity.

“The Bible says that when we die, we go to be with God. We won’t be here anymore. We won’t be in pain. We’ll be with God.”

He sat there for a moment, very still, and then he looked at me with mournful eyes. “I don’t want to die. I like it here, with you. I like our house. I don’t want to leave.”

“You don’t have to worry about that today,” I said, but he wasn’t convinced. He pushed his face against my chest and said it again, this time in a whisper.

“I don’t want to die. I like it here.”

* * * * *

About a week after the funeral, Leo needed to have a minor surgery for which he would have to be put under with anesthesia. The night before the surgery I took him up to bed once again. I was feeling emotionally fragile in the face of our little boy going under the knife. I sang him his normal songs, and then he asked for his favorite.

“Dad, can you sing about the river?”

There is a river we must cross over,
When life’s sun goes to sleep in the west;
There’ll be a light for me at the crossing,
Guiding me to that home of sweet rest.

I could barely get the words out. I tucked my face in tight against his tiny shoulder and sang, the words catching in my throat. It is a beautiful thing, the ways that we comfort each other.

* * * * *

Fast forward two days after his surgery.

There is something that tears inside of you when your child is screaming in pain and you’re holding them down so that you can change the dressing on their wound. There is something unnatural about inflicting pain on your own child, even when you know it must be done, that it’s for their good.

Later, after we had all cried, after we sat in the new quiet still sweating from the distress, after the dressing had been changed and he was lying comfortably on the sofa hiccuping sobs, tiny bird sounds, Leo looked up at me.

“You had to put the bandage right at the top of my pain,” he said quietly. It was not an accusation. It was simply a statement of fact.

“I’m so sorry, buddy,” I said. “I don’t like doing that.”

“It’s okay. I’m sorry I kicked mama. I’m sorry I screamed at you.”

* * * * *

Now, it’s Sunday morning, and a low gray sky has pushed away yesterday’s blue. Maile’s mom is in town, always a pleasure, and she is on the front porch with the kids, all of them drinking coffee, watching the cars go by on James Street. I am alone in the dining room. Soon, we will get ready for church.

There is something about the last two weeks that seems crucial, something about funerals and not wanting to die, surgeries and dressings over painful wounds that must nevertheless be changed, and trying to sing songs that catch in our throats. There is something about pain and life and lullabies that I’m beginning to grasp.

I feel it now in new ways, the connection between pain and healing, singing and dying. We are, all of us, trying not to die, trying to be okay with dying. We are, all of us, trying to heal, trying to avoid the pain of healing. I think we need to have more grace for each other. I think we need to try to remember that all of us carry our wounds with us into the world.

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On Days When Spring is Near

Leo still laughs at me when I make funny faces.

I walk out onto the porch with Poppy and Leo on a Sunday afternoon, the kind that convinces us spring still exists and is, in fact, not that far off. There are tiny mounds of snow in the shadowy places of the world, but the sky is blue and people walk by on James Street wearing light jackets–not the heavy, winter coats I’ve seen going past for the last three or four months.

“Let’s say where the cars are going,” 4-year-old Leo says, his voice also bearing hints of the coming season. I think I know what he means. I wait for the next car to approach. It is an old, gray Honda.

“That car’s going to the place where we get hair cuts,” he says. Another car approaches. “That car’s going to the movies.”

As each car passes, Leo makes up an imaginary destination. The library. Penny’s Ice Cream shop. The mall.

“Maybe we should give Poppy a turn,” I say, and he agrees. We have to wait a bit, but when the next car comes by, we both turn our eyes towards her with expectation.

“That car’s going to a house,” she says in her raspy, high-pitched, 2-year-old voice, grinning a Cheshire grin and looking at us with questions in her eyes, wondering if she did it right.

“Mimi’s house?” I ask. She nods.

“Nice one, Poppy,” I say, and we stand there, getting colder as the afternoon passes. Maile comes out, stands there in her coat, still wearing her house slippers. And the cars go by.

* * * * *

Sunday night, three in the morning, and a small hand pats my blankets. A small voice whispers, “Dad, I’m scared.”

“Of what?” I ask, not sure what time it is, not sure what planet I’m on.

“I’m just scared.”

“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” I whisper, my voice hoarse. I cough.

“I’m scared,” Leo insists. I sigh.

“Want to sleep with me on the floor?” I ask. I know if I bring him into bed, none of us will get any sleep. He nods in the dark. I grab a few pillows, a few blankets, and we make a bed on the floor.

I fall asleep, his tiny hand on my shoulder.

* * * * *

A few days later I am working at Prince Street Cafe when Maile comes in with the kids. Leo is very pleased to see me sitting at one of the high tables, and he climbs up, perches there, staring at my computer.

“Are you working?”

“Yes, I am.”

He looks at the large glass windows. “Those windows look like you could put your hand through them, like a waterfall,” he observes. And he is right. The glass is clean. The day is clear.

I lean towards him.

“I like when you come to visit me,” I say.

He smiles.

 

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Regarding a Weekend We Won’t Soon Forget (and Exciting News About My Next Book)

We sat on sofas and on the floor. We tried to catch up on each other’s lives in a few short days. We ate and we laughed and listened. Some of their written words read out loud made me cry.

There were late nights over hot tea and a game that had us shouting and laughing all over again. There was a wood fire in the fireplace. There were quiet walks on an empty street.

There was this sense that, while I write alone, I am not alone. This realization felt like bread and wine.

We hugged outside the restaurant, knowing another long year awaited. But it felt like it might be okay.

* * * * *

Maile and I drove away early, heading towards our home, 500 miles away. The snow came down, and the roads were covered. We advanced slowly, followed the tracks of the car in front of us. The world was coated in white, and the road felt tenuous, unpredictable, like it might tire of us at any moment and toss us aside.

We passed four accidents within a mile of each other, cars spun off onto the shoulder. Hoods smashed in. They faced the wrong direction, as if lost. One car was burnt to a crisp.

At dusk, as we passed the exit that went to the college where we had met, Maile pointed.

“Did you see that?”

“See what?”

“Five deer,” she said, awe in her voice, and a bit of sadness, “standing at the edge of the wood, in the blowing snow.”

* * * * *

We picked up the kids at my parents’ house, loaded their belongings in the back of the truck, the snow settling on us like a light blessing. We drove slowly home, unloaded, and entered the house. It was a whirlwind of children and suitcases, snow clothes and snacks, wet floors and the repeated command that turned to a plea, “Go to bed!” The radiators were already hot. Out front, James Street was quiet, covered in a layer of snow.

In the mail that had been waiting for us, I saw a manila envelope, and I tore it open. Inside, the designed pages for my new novel, Light from Distant Stars. There it was: the title page, the dedication, the first line.

“Cohen Marah clears his throat quietly, more out of discomfort than the presence of any particular thing that needs clearing, and attempts to step over the body for a second time.”

As Maile had said as we drove slowly along the snow-filled highway, “Well, this is a weekend we won’t soon forget.”

* * * * *

To find out more about Light from Distant Stars, or to find links to preorder (and basically make me the happiest person on the planet), click HERE.

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The First Time I Read Charlotte’s Web to Leo, It Ended With Tears…So Naturally We’re Reading it Again

About six months ago, I read Charlotte’s Web to Leo for the first time. We read one chapter every night, and he fell in love with Charlotte immediately. When we got to the last page of the chapter when Charlotte dies, he demanded that I stop reading.

“Leo, we have to finish the chapter,” I said. “We’re almost there.”

He kept protesting. It was unlike him. I couldn’t tell if he was entirely serious or not, so I finished the chapter. As soon as I read the last sentence–“No one was with her when she died”–he burst into tears.

But, in the last few months, he has recovered, and he asked if we could read it again. As someone who appreciates good literature, loves Charlotte’s Web, and isn’t always completely enthralled with his bedtime stories, I readily agreed.

We’re about halfway through, and last night we reached the chapter where Mrs. Arable, Fern’s mother, becomes so concerned with Fern’s behavior that she goes to visit the doctor. They end up talking about the mysterious appearance of the messages in Charlotte’s web.

“…Still, I don’t understand how those words got into the web. I don’t understand it, and I don’t like what I can’t understand.”

“None of us do,” said Dr. Dorian, sighing. “I’m a doctor. Doctors are supposed to understand everything. But I don’t understand everything, and I don’t intend to let it worry me.”

Mrs. Arable fidgeted. “Fern says the animals talk to each other. Dr. Dorian, do you believe animals talk?”

“I never heard one say anything,” he replied. “But that proves nothing. It is quite possible that an animal has spoken civilly to me and that I didn’t catch the remark because I wasn’t paying attention. Children pay better attention than grownups. If Fern says that the animals in Zuckerman’s barn talk, I’m quite ready to believe her. Perhaps if people talked less, animals would talk more. People are incessant talkers–I can give you my word on that.”

What a beautiful way to view the world. What are you having trouble understanding right now? Would talking less allow you to hear what’s really being said?

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What I Found in the Basement (or, how 30 years passed in a moment)

I went down into the basement this week to return something, a wrench or a hammer or some other tool that’s been floating around the upstairs like a loitering teenager. I navigated the rickety basement stairs and walked into the part of the basement we’ve managed to fix up into something that resembles a living room. That’s when I saw it.

It was an old printer paper box, it’s bottom cut out, somehow fastened to the stone wall–a homemade basketball net that Sam and Cade had made. I had heard them earlier that day, shouting and laughing and talking trash to each other. Protests of “foul” and “what a shot” and “nooooo!”

And it was strange, seeing it there, because it put me in a time machine, back to when I was 11 or 12 and playing basketball in my basement bedroom with a tennis ball and a plastic, one-gallon ice cream container, the bottom cut out. It was that cheap ice cream, but I didn’t know any better back then. I loved it.

30 years later, another hoop. Time is a circle.

* * * * *

Our oldest daughter went to Florida for a week with my parents to visit her cousins and her aunts and uncle and great-grandmother. Her leaving sparked an unexpected bout of emotion, as Maile and I navigated what our life will look like in not too many years. These children of ours, who we’ve fed and watered and clothed and nudged along life’s path, are not all that far from jumping out of the nest. Visions of baby birds plummeting through the air, spreading their shaky wings, gathering air under them, and coasting to a hopefully safe landing on a faraway beach come to mind.

With Lucy gone, there was one fewer place to set at the dining room table each night. One less opinion on various things. One less voice up late with Cade and me, after the younger kids are in bed. Even though it was only one less person, it felt like we were missing more than that. It felt like we were missing a vital part, one we couldn’t go on for much longer without.

I thought of my friends who recently lost children, some to accidents, some to cancer, some to suicide. I don’t know how to even imagine making my way along that kind of path. I guess that space would never be filled.

I waited up on the night my parents were driving back with her from Florida. I suppose I could have gone to bed and woke up when they called to let me know they were on our street, but to be honest, I couldn’t sleep. She was on her way home. I couldn’t wait to see her. When they got here, just after midnight, I walked out onto James Street in my socks, out into the freezing cold weather, and I hugged her and helped her carry her things.

We are all here again, under one roof. For now. The days keep passing. In another minute, or another thirty years, one of my kids will walk down into the basement of their own home and find a tentative basketball net stuck to a wall. This is how time passes. This is how one day melts into the next.

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Keep Looking for the Good Stuff

When I was a nine-year-old kid living on a farm in central PA, my friend and I ran down the long lane past the apple tree and pear tree and cherry tree, across the empty back road, and into the church’s parking lot. Sometimes, we rode our bikes there, and in the late spring days the air was still cool enough to blur our eyes. The trees were a kind of new green, not the shadowy green they would become in the summer heat, but a lime lollipop color that was new and fresh.

We each pulled a penny from one of our pockets, got down on our hands and knees on the macadam, and looked for Fool’s Gold. If Wikipedia can be believed, this is actually something called Pyrite, but that didn’t matter to us back then. We wanted the shiny stuff. We’d look and look and look, and when we finally saw a piece, we’d dig it out of the ground with our penny, pocket the gold, and keep looking.

* * * * *

I’ve been reading through the Psalms in the Message—I love the creativity and poetic language Eugene Peterson uses. And the other day I read Psalm 106:

They traded the Glory

            For a cheap piece of sculpture—a grass-chewing bull!

As the story goes, when the Israelites thought they had been abandoned by God and Moses, they threw their jewelry into the fire, melted it down, and created a calf to worship. They were so desperate to have something tangible to lead them, something they could see and touch and feel, that they were willing to walk away from the God who had miraculously provided for them such a short time before.

They were willing to trade the Glory for a cheap replacement.

* * * * *

Whether or not you’re a Christian, there’s a clear application here: stop trading in the good stuff for meaningless crap. Keep going for the real, the true, the meaningful.

I know it can be hard to keep believing in the work you’re creating when it feels like there’s nothing on the horizon, no hope for a bigger audience, no real reason to keep going. It’s hard to keep going when it feels like you’re leaving a wake of failure behind you. Or maybe you’re having trouble finding hope when it comes to your spouse, your kid, your church, your business, your dream. Maybe you’re finding it hard to keep hoping in yourself. I understand this. When everything seems to have vanished, when our goals and dreams seem unattainable, we just want something we can touch. And we get to the point where we’re willing to trade in the good stuff we can’t see (even if it’s just around the corner) for just about anything tangible, even if it’s a cheap imitation of that beautiful, wonderful thing we’ve been chasing for such a long time. Even if it means walking away from the Glory.

We give up way too early, way too often.

The key is hope. Trust. Faith.

As Journey would say, Don’t stop beleeeeevin’…

So keep hoping. Keep going. Keep trying. One more day. Find someone who will encourage you to stay focused on the good, the beautiful, the true, the real. And don’t trade the good stuff in for Fool’s Gold. If you do, you might walk away with pockets that feel full, but it’s really just a pocketful of shiny junk. The good stuff is out there, waiting for you.

* * * * *

What’s the good stuff that feels elusive to you right now? What’s the Fool’s Gold you’re tempted to go after? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

* * * * *

As of Thursday evening, you can get the Kindle version of my first novel, The Day the Angels Fell, for only $4.70! Check it out HERE.