I've often wondered, as I suppose any parent has, what would continue to bind me to the earth if my child died.
I don't know, is the answer. I have two close friends who've had young children die, and another friend whose one son committed suicide and the second died of brain cancer. Not sure how they start their days, what they think to push them forward, where their strength comes from. But they have gone on with their lives. I don't see their pain, but it must lurk somewhere.
Perhaps if you're a religious person you may find some hope in the belief that sooner or later you will be reunited with your loved one, however there is no such consolation for an atheist such as myself. The thought of your child dying seems that it would be an end to all … why write a book, take a trip, watch a movie, eat a meal, take the garbage out? What could seem to have any importance at that point. Still, my friends have persevered. Perhaps it is their spouses that provide the anchor.
My own little bundle of joy is now 15 years on this earth, fiercely smart, strong both physically and mentally, yet willful, torn by the contradictions of adolescence, looking for a way forward. Sometimes, well often actually, I am accused of various unspeakable acts, of being old, and so on. Everyone told me that these years would come, but it's hard to conceive of the hurt and difficulty when they suddenly appear one day: seeing the sweet smiling face of the flesh of your flesh suddenly turn into cold contempt. Fortunately there is often a smile not far off.
And yet my child is still the gravity holding me to the earth; a hug worth more than a world of riches; and if I can only coax a laugh once a week instead of daily, it will have to do. And it does.
But children do die, and parents struggle to hold on to … something. In this Sunday's New York Times Jayson Greene penned a solemn essay of both death and life beyond: Children Don't Always Live. It begins:
My daughter, Greta, was 2 years old when she died—or rather, when she was killed. A piece of masonry fell eight stories from an improperly maintained building and struck her in the head while she sat on a bench on the Upper West Side of Manhattan with her grandmother.
It's worth a read if you can muster your courage.
