Last night when Miley died unexpectedly, Jeff and I didn't feel much like eating dinner. This morning when I sat at my computer with my bagel and coffee drink I read an email from a friend from church who's infant daughter (who I know from caring for in the nursery, she's a cutie!) fell from a 2nd floor of an apartment onto concrete 14 feet below and was airflighted to the hospital for a skull fracture.
I couldn't eat my bagel. (Baby S will be okay. She's been released from the hospital now and just has to recover completely.)
The older I get, the more connections to others I make over time, the more I experience heartache. I know, I know - this is the human condition. That's just life.
But my heart breaks. My heart breaks for my dear friend who's adult children are rejecting her. I shake my head sadly when a congregant of my friend/co-worker's was part of a police stand-off in New Mexico and shot himself. (Even if he was crazy, he was someone's father.) It may be PMS, but I can't look at pictures of Chengdu or the schools that collapsed in Dujiangyan without crying.
I know how passionately Chinese parents love their child. Notice I say: child. To lose that child, that one hope for your future, that one little person you love and adore and have doted on and sent off to school in hopes of a bright future - devastating.
We had friends from Beijing over for dinner about a year ago. My coworker Leo was just weeks away from marrying Fiona. Fiona was a lovely girl and she loved playing with our kids, especially our youngest who was about 2, nearly 3 at the time.
He snuggled in her lap and talked to her - she was one of those naturally nurturing and loving people that you could just imagine would be a wonderful mother some day. Fiona wept. She seemed happy, but tears ran down her face.
When I asked Leo why Fiona was upset he tried to explain that she was simply emotional at the site of my lovely family. He explained that having a child like my young son was their greatest hope. To have a beautiful family - that one child they could have, their very greatest dream in life. They couldn't hope for two, just one child.
So imagine the grief of these parents. Losing that one very loved child. Losing their lifelong dream. Losing their family.
I can understand their anger at the school collapse site. How could a school, a building filled with the greatest treasures in China, be built so shoddy that it couldn't withstand an earthquake? Some hotels and stores are standing - how can it be that the school isnt'? I can just imagine their frustration. I can't imagine their grief.
Hopefully some glimmer of good news will come my way before lunchtime. Not that it would hurt me to miss a few calories..but for now, I'm not feeling able to eat.
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