Friday, January 18, 2008

The Persistence of Grief

On Television shows everyone gets over just about anything by next week, and usually within thirty minutes. Death, dismemberment, divorce, unemployment, they all resolve back to a happy face by the end of the current show. The hidden message is that life resolves just as quickly.

Of course it does not. After Jessica died my brother sent me a clip from a book where David Oman McKay's wife was talking to a relative, when she was in her eighties, about how the pain of her son's death was still with her.

At this time of year, as I go from Christmas through a couple days past Valentine's Day, the persistence of grief always comes to mind.

I think I have so much to write about it and then, suddenly almost, it is more than words can convey.




As I blog on religion at Mormon Matters, I expect that I will revert back, more and more, to reflection and life, writing more to those who know grief or who are in recovery (but, alas, never fully recovered) here. Two very different blogs, two very different topics.


Jews should be proselytizing about a God that you can quarrel with. Catholics should be proselytizing about a God who is love, who represents a hereafter where there's no hell, who wants you to lead a life where you can confess your sins and feel much better afterwards. Those are lovely concepts of God."

A great quote, sent me by Suzette Haden Elgin