Mourning Someone Who Isn't "Yours" Anymore

 

How do you mourn the loss of someone who isn’t really in your life anymore, but made an impact for nearly 20 years?  I don’t really know.

This weekend, my former sister-in-law passed away. She was 58.  Her name is Tina and she was a bright, colorful flower.

I mourn for her mama, because at any age, the thought of burying your child is one no one should have to entertain. Her first born, her grown up little girl is gone and I cannot fathom the enormous hole in her heart.

I mourn for her daddy.  I think it always hits the dad so much more than people realize and being who men are so often raised to be, hold it inside to be the strong one.

I mourn for my ex-husband because he lost his big sissy. He lost the leader of the play pack from when they were little, the one who assistant “mommed” him as a kid.  I know his heart is broken.

I mourn for his brothers and sisters who lost the leader of their pack, their extra mom, their Tina.

I mourn for the wives, husbands, boyfriends, cousins, nieces, nephews, and grandkids who won’t have that firecracker of energy in their lives any longer. 

I mourn for my son, who lost his Aunt.

She was a firecracker.  You knew when this woman walked into a building, even if you were rooms away. 

I know mourning for her myself isn’t kosher.  The rule with exes and their family is that you’re supposed to dislike them, cut them out of your life forever.  But I call BS on that. There may be some that this fits, but it is not the rule.  It ought not be.  These people, this family was MY family for nearly 20 years.  She was my sister-in-law for nearly 15. The expectation that I cease from loving these people is ridiculous.  The expectation that what hurts them doesn’t hurt me any longer is just laughable.  Our lives were intertwined for nearly two decades.  To toss that time aside suggests that those years were worthless and nothing of value came from them.  We all know that is folly.

If you’ve been married to someone that you spent a large portion of your adult life with, built a life, experienced death and live, had a child, you are going to be impacted by what happens to that additional family you had. 

SO BS on the hurtful expectation that because you are divorced from someone means you automatically don’t care about them.  BS on the notion that what hurts them doesn’t hurt you because you were intertwined in their lives and regardless of what is said now, at one point, that person was your whole life. It is applicable more so if you have children.  I don’t understand how people can look at their child and still hate the person who that child is half of.  It makes no logical sense to me. For me, I will always care for my son’s father because without him, I would not be mama to the most amazing kid in the world- no bias.  I will always have concern for his health and well-being.  I will always want him to be happy because he deserves it. Just because a marriage fails, doesn’t mean we have to want the other to fail.

So in the face of the expectation that people just disappear from your life- BS - I am sad because this world will not know Tina anymore. There will be no more people for her to meet and explode love and kindness on.  I am sad because while she doesn’t explode love and kindness on me anymore, she did for so long.

Tina, I know I’m not your sister-in-law anymore, but thank you for exploding love, kindness, acceptance of this wild southern girl into your family so long ago. Thank you for the laughter, the silliness, the boldness you lived with.  Thank you for doing you.  I know you’re dancing now, exploding love on our Heavenly Father.

Moving Forward and Looking Back

 

We cannot move forward without looking back.  If history has taught us nothing else, it has taught that by ignoring the failures and disasters of the past, we only set ourselves up for more disasters to come.  This applies to natural disasters, personal disasters and yes, even the political ones.

At the risk of sounding too cliché, imagine centuries worth of dirt being swept under the same rug.  Eventually it becomes a stumbling block.  Well, we have tripped over that massive pile of dirt and have fallen smack on our faces.  What have we swept? Continued racism, sexism, prejudice, hatred, bigotry, hypocrisy, arrogance, and corruption. Hypocrisy and arrogance are chief among these sins, for without hypocrisy and arrogance, these would have never been swept under the rug in the first place.

I am truly struggling with all the things these days.  It is enough to parent during a pandemic.  I am truly blessed to have an incredibly observant child, an employer who supports family first, a husband who works from home, and my ability to work from home part time. (Please don’t get me wrong, days in the office are a blast these days, even when separated by glass walls.)  I love our country.  I get all warm and tingly inside when I have an opportunity to dig into the law of the Constitution.  Although, there are definitely cringeworthy moments.  I love the IDEA of America, of the United States.  I grieve at what it has become, and I know I am not alone.  But the stress this uncivil war has caused on so many, including myself, has been unbearable at times.

What then do I do?  Do I ignore it, stick my head in the sand and let what happens, happen?  No, I cannot, I love this country too much. I love this crazy experiment.  I love the idea and the fact that all men and women of all colors, races, ethnicities, and religions ARE created equally.  But that idea doesn’t come from the Constitution; that idea comes from God.

I think one of the reasons this has been so gut-wrenchingly hard for me is that I do believe in a God of love, but I know God is JUST, which means, because I am a Christian, and because I love God, I MUST believe in accountability, and support it. Which I do!  I am unable to put words to how so many who claim Christ can ignore accountability now and request we push past this egregious afront to our democracy, our way of life, our Constitution, in the name of fake unity.   Fake unity is not unity.  Fake unity is a gloss over seething undercurrents of resentment, jealousy, hurt, fury and pain.  Unity cannot happen until there is accountability. 

I am not only talking about the insurrection, incited by the former President.  I am talking about the degradation of that office by his words and behavior. I am talking about the looking past of everything any one of us would wash our child’s mouth out with soap about.  I am talking about moving the bar for the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES so low, that it no longer seems to exist. 

I am embarrassed by the behavior of the Senators and Representatives that are more concerned with their reelection by a “base” that espouses hatred, prejudice, and conspiracy over doing what is BEST for our country.  Holding someone accountable will only divide our country if our leaders encourage it.  If our leaders encourage reconciliation, unity will follow.  That’s why they’re supposed to be our “leaders.”  We, as a citizenry, have overall done an okay job electing these leaders, but let us face it head on:  we have screwed some of those up royally.

So, what do we do now?  We cannot sit by and watch our democracy crumble, regardless of who you voted for.  For me, it means a few things:  1.  We can no longer be complacent and ignore our right, privilege and duty to knowledgably vote.  2.  We need to realize that while it all affects us, it affects us ALL.  Meaning, we are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers.  It is not only about one of us or a few.  We share this country, we share this planet. Isolating ourselves and voting for what will ONLY benefit us is a sure-fire way to create division.  It is not all about me. 3.  We need to vocalize this to our representatives now in an emphatic and legal way.  Protests are great, violence NEVER is.  4.  For me, and for I hope everyone who claims Christ, the true authentic Jesus who came to save the marginalized, the downtrodden, the oppressed, the woman and the man, the Jew and the Gentile: we need to pray.  We need to pray for wisdom for ourselves and our leaders. We need to pray that self-serving attitudes are replaced with attitudes of grace and mercy.  We need to pray that what is good wins out the day, and not lies.  We need to pray that those who seek to destroy are held accountable.  We need to pray that we live the life Jesus truly called us to: Love God, Love people, put others first.

Getting to Unity

I haven’t written much as of late.  It has been so very hard to try to put thoughts down because they overwhelm my mind and heart at times.  I try to settle them.  As usual, a run does me well.  Yoga has served to help too.  Hugs of a little boy.  Snuggles from a little dog.  Reassurances from my husband. All of these things have helped settle my thoughts and feelings, but they are still there, simmering beneath the surface at the ready.

I feel like a lot of us are there.  We are unsettled because we have watched an insurrection take place at our Capitol, fueled by words of one who should understand and rightly bear the mantle of his position. Regardless of if one’s opinion surrounding whether it was an intended incitement, it cannot be clearer that many careless words did in fact incite.  We see a cross in front of the Capitol not too far from a hastily built, but functional gallows- noose included.  We see someone carrying a flagpole with two flags on it: on the bottom “Jesus is King” and above it, a Trump flag.  We see leaders of our country calling for the hasty overthrow of a government they swore to serve, a Constitution they vowed to protect.  We see hate and vitriol between those who were once friends over their choice of elected officials.  We are rattled, shaken to our very core, as we discover more and more of the violence that took place on that Wednesday, January 6.  And unfortunately, we are shaken because every state capitol has received valid, credible threats of violence surrounding the Inauguration of our next President, Joe Biden.

I have heard a lot of people using the word “unity” indicating where we need to be, but I do not think we are there.  There are angry people everywhere.  The insurrectionists were angry.  Those who didn’t support that act, but still voted for Donald Trump may be angry.  I can tell you with certainty, there are many who did not vote for him that are beyond angry.  We are angry.  And unity cannot come from anger.  To reference Brene Brown, unity cannot exist without accountability.  And at present, anger is at the forefront, we await accountability.

Unity is the goal.  Unity doesn’t mean that we are not different in our opinions by any means.  Unity can exist if there is a common goal, and I think, the common goal are the ideals of America.  All men and women, of all colors, religions, marital status, socioeconomic status, gender identity treated equally and fairly.  We may differ in how we get there, but I think, I hope we have a common goal.

I believe we all want to be a patriot, but if being a patriot looks like insurrection, we should want no part of it. “Patriotism is rooted in humility.” (Dan Rather, What Unites Us.)  Wearing a flag pin is only patriotic if it accurately reflects the heart of a patriot, one marked by humility, gratitude, and perseverance.  Being a patriot requires honesty, and that means we must honestly look at what has gone wrong in this experiment of democracy.  Right now that means the investigations must continue and accountability, no matter who that includes, must occur.

I think we’re okay to not be at unity yet.  I think as a nation, being in the anger stage is about right. There are some who are still in denial, some who have moved on to bargaining.  We are grieving as a nation.  Until we walk through accountability and the grieving process, we cannot get to unity- not full unity.  We can unify our ideals, we can unify to fight a growing cancer in our country like white supremacy.  However, as a nation, with as many opinions and ideas as we have, unity is an extraordinarily challenging thing to accomplish.  We must respect the process of getting there, of getting closer and then having to take a step back, and then continue.  The struggle itself can often foster unity on fronts never considered.  Maybe this is our work.  Maybe just the work of grieving the great divide within our country and the forthcoming, tireless, hard, heart work of finding our common footing, will garner some unity.  Maybe.