Christmas in High Contrast
It’s Christmas Day as I write this. We have opened our presents with the kids and we have beaucoup family coming over through the day. We’ll be like a bunch of Who’s gathered around our tree, drinking our nog, sharing stories of life’s joys. But this Christmas will be different…
Last night at 11:30, our friend Frank called. His wife, our good friend of 25 years, Lori, had just died an hour earlier. It wasn’t unexpected. She had early onset Alzheimer’s – she was younger than me at 57 or 58, which always gives a guy pause – and it hit her in a way that took both the brain and the body in the same chariot. It was hard watching the process, since it took a decade to kill her. At first, she would get lost and have trouble finding her way home. The physical ravages came later and near the end, she seldom recognized Frank. In a very real sense, her passing is a relief.
But what a contrast to Christmas Day, the celebration of the birth of the most influential individual to ever walk the planet, even if you don’t accept him as your Savior – and I do, but that will wait for other times. Birth and Death juxtaposed like the Love and Hate written on the knuckles of Robert Mitchum in The Night of the Hunter. The contrast is startling, but what does it do for and to us? I contributed a piece in GL Hoffman’s blog, What Would Dad Say, that argued that, just as the binocular vision of our eyes in which each eye sees a slightly different image gives us the perception of depth, all perception of depth in our mind requires us to hold two different images in our mind simultaneously, lest we become perceivers of only a flat reality. It opens us to depth of understanding, the reason true humor is based in defiance of the tragic underpinnings of life. I see Obama trying to do it with his "Team of Rivals" approach. The truth is, it is the reality of death for all of us that gives depth to lives that would otherwise become vapid and pointless.
We don’t like to deal with death. Like Woody Allen said, "It’s not that I’m afraid to die. I just don’t want to be there when it happens." We fear it, yet because of it we are gloriously alive right now! Gilda Radnor captured it as well as anyone in the beginning of her book It’s Always Something. Dying of cancer herself, she wrote the story of a woman forced over the edge of a cliff by wolves, to hang suspended from a branch above death by a huge drop to the rocks below. What a dilemma, death by wolves or death by falling. She looked straight ahead at the cliff face, finding a wild strawberry growing there. With her free hand, she plucked it and tasted it proclaiming, "How sweet!" It was her metaphor for the life we are all living and her encouragement for all to reach into the moment and pluck its sweetness as our own.
Well, Lori, I raise my nog in salute to you this fine Christmas morning. The wolves and the rocks can’t threaten you now – and I pray that all the strawberries where you find yourself are Oh So Sweet!
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Tags: Friends, Holidays, Tragedies
Hello Conrad, I noticed your comment that you just began writing this new blog. I wish you well as you begin to build on the excellent launch I see here.
Christmas is a time that we may fondly remember those folks precious to us who are no longer around our table. Your post is so appropriate because the birth of a savior also takes us to the other reality – life on earth is short. Some have not as much time as others. But, there is so much hope brought to us.
Great site and moving contrast of the spaces between life and death, Conrad! Thanks for sharing. Lori’s vulnerability – as it touched you and others. The story reminds me of Jean Vanier’s suggestion that people like Lori teach all of us when we stop to see life as it is lived in good and difficult places, through the lives of vulnerable people. Hopefully her life lessons will live on in those of us who see Creation’s handiwork and remember to reach for – and share with others – the fresh berries before us daily! Stay blessed!
Conrad, I am so sorry about your friend’s death. It is especially poignant that it happened at Christmas time. Whenever I hear of a death of someone younger than me, I always think of our own mortality–we are now older than that person will ever get to be. So there must be something significant for us yet to do! Thanks for sharing your blog with us.
First, welcome to the blogoverse. And, i am sorry to hear about your friend, Increasingly, these stories seem to hit home more…we are getting on the age that when we die, it doesn’t really SURPRISE others.
Sucks.
Thank you so much, Robyn. I want to get your excellent blog into my blogroll, too. This is new to me and the substance you always produce is what I aspire to.
Good insight! And we are very much concentrating on Frank. I think his grief will unfold in stages and he compliments us by having us as the friends he is unashamed to cry with. Then, we’ll share the berries!
And, thanks for coming by, Janet. One more way we can share what has already become so rich! Tell the others!
Yep. Sucks. But, if I croak soon, you damn well better show some surprise, bud!
Our journeys back and forth should be a kick…
Conrad -
I am so sad about your friend losing her struggle. I have lost a lot of loved ones and am always taken aback at each passing, there seems to be a close birth. This happens so much that I always marvel at how each of us must make way for others by moving on to our next phase.
What a fabulous website – hurrah for you!!! I am a total blogosphere neophyte! This is goiing to be so much fun for you and I plan to spend lot of time reading the posts!
Wishing you a prosperous and productive new year!
Deb
Thanks, Deb. We will miss her. But, while we are still here, let’s make the most of it!
My grandfather died of Alzheimers and it wasn’t pretty. Relief is a term I would refer to what the family felt at his death. I hope you have a wonderful new year despite the sad news.
Vanessa’s last blog post..The evolution of my (our) blog
Vanessa, We are not reminded of Lori’s sad death every day. Still, Frank is and so many like yourself have experienced it as such an immediate and lasting event. That is where the potential pain lies for all of us, because this is such a cruel disease.
Thank you for your kind words and your kind wishes. We are doing well and are happy and wish the same in this new year to you and yours!