Beyond Big Grief

What is the kind of grief that takes your breath away? Is it the suddenness and then the shock of it? It seems like that kind of grief is the most difficult to accept. I’ve known the kind of grief that seems to kick you in the chest and make it hard to breathe for a while. But I also have known the road back. Today, my life is filled with many people I might have lost track of if not for Facebook. Twin daughters of one of my best friends when I lived in Kansas City just lost their father. He wasn’t old, only 60, or sick. I don’t know the circumstances but he died suddenly. He was a gentle man. The first time I met him he was playing the guitar on the front porch of a battered women’s shelter. He had a big toothy smile. He sounded like a Kansan, not quite southern, but not quite northern either. My friend eventually married him and they had two really sweet twin girls. Since FB I have gotten to learn about their lives again after losing track of them first when they went to grade school and then again when they were in their later primary grades. The last time I had run into them was around their 10th or 11th year. They were decked out in their softball uniforms in a Panera with their grandfather, who I had met many times. They had those big smiles. They are out of college now, making lives for themselves. I was grateful I had the chance to know them when they were first born through those very early school years. Tonight I remember them as the busy little girls they were, playing on the couch, watching TV, and laughing. Tonight too, I am remembering my own experiences of that take your breath away kind of grief and the day-to-day effort it takes to breathe normally again. It does happen after awhile and there will always be that remembering of the big grief. But past that breathless place, is the joy and for them, the man with the big smile.