Last Saturday morning, I woke up thinking about the events that had taken place locally and nationally the week prior. But for Swaggy encouraging me to take him out for fresh air, I might have remained in my thoughts a while longer. I went reluctantly into the backyard with Swaggy and in my aggravated state looked into the distance and saw a rainbow. Instantly, my demeanor and outlook became positive. I am not sure why rainbows speak hope and positivity, but after that week of heart-wrenching, unbelievable and unexplainable losses of life I needed a reminder to “look unto the hills from which cometh my help.”
Life presents moments that can simply take your breath away. Often people say that something has taken their breath away when the thing or circumstance left them speechless from excitement or overwhelmed by the beauty or amazing qualities of the thing. In general, the moments capable of taking my breath away were not made by a human. I have experienced breathless moments after seeing majestic mountain ranges or brilliant sunsets or the clarity and purity of a precious gem or my father’s light brown eyes. Those kinds of things have stolen my breath away in a good and gratifying way. That gratifying breathlessness literally stole me away to a quiet, peaceful almost magical boundless space where it seemed that only that awe-inspiring thing existed. My time communing in such a space has always led me to ponder the why’s that might answer the mother of all questions: How did this breath-taking moment happen? Then I would ponder the follow up question: How did this breath taking moment happen to me (or someone I care about)?
In moments I have spent basking in marvelous wonder riddled with rhetorical questions, I felt blessed and satisfied. I was blessed to enjoy a calm, peaceful, amazingly wondrous place. Like an addict, my satisfaction yearned for more satisfaction, more pleasurable journeys. As a parent of young children, it warmed my soul to see my kids with bright eyes and mouths agape from the pleasant shock of a natural wonder. I enjoyed the ooh’s and ah’s like those of an audience fascinated when a magician’s slight of hand tricked the human eye. As my kids and I reacted in puzzled curiosity, they rarely expected me to be able to explain the why or the how. However, when the thing or event taking our collective breath away resulted from a tragic, unexplainable and seemingly untimely thing or circumstance their eyes and expressions screamed, “Mama, why?” and “Mama, how did this happen?”
What irony that we found ourselves asking the same questions in our breathless moments after loss that we asked during sheer amazement and wonder?! I also found it ironic that the same words described both experiences. While there were similarities in the height and type of emotions, there was no burning desire for me to provide an explanation for the perceived amazing or whimsical things. However, my heartache in the times of significant loss burned for answers to the why’s and the how’s. The emotional impact of the loss and tragic events loitered in my spirit and hovered like a mist on a cloudy day. In those moments, I was disappointed that my parenting vault of remedies failed to cure the pain and sadness. Somehow the expressions of sympathy and overtures of “adult” sayings about bad things happening to good people and finding good in the bad rang of cliché and rather inadequate mama tools needed to heal the hurts of my babies.
The loss of a family friend last week and the tragic attack on innocent people in a tourist town down south, pierced my heart. Even though I don’t have young children, I felt the need to offer comfort and explanations to lessen the volume of emotions mounting within many young people around me. I wanted to say or do something that would speak to those emotions that surface in these types of moments that take your breath away. I think the moments of breathlessness from pain and loss felt different to me because I knew that the source of the event or loss was beyond my control.
Parents work hard to maintain control of the environments of the ones they care about so moments of tragic loss, especially losses of other young people, compromise the shields of protection built by the grown ups. Moreover, the encounters with the unexplainable, beautiful things tend not to establish residency in my head for as long as the unexplainable losses or tragic events and I expect that other parents have a similar experience with loss and tragedy. Last week I found myself using the unexplainable good things like rainbows and breath to cope with the unexpected losses. I spent some time last week confronting the losses, my pain and my regrets. I engaged in dialogues and reflective services to honor those lost. In both instances, pain which was manifested through silence and somberness evolved into celebratory expressive memories that moved the audiences to calls for action.
People vary in their opinions about how to cope with loss and tragedy, but from my parental lens I think movement and action become the only way to secure the armor intended to protect those of us who remain. As a friend of one lost, I believe the call to action honors the soul of the friend in a way that enables the living to heal and preserve the best qualities and passions of the one we cared for while enabling us to secure their legacy. Calls to action after a national or global tragedy assure us that humanitarian compassion lives. I believe that these calls to action give us and therefore our children hope. We hope that movements of support, encouragement and resources will empower our communities. The calls to action and the movement of the community is restorative. The active decisions to honor those lost and support those who live empowers individuals and groups in the communities. Watching the community during breathless moments respond with positivity renews my faith that the village will embrace the challenge of standing with our children through the moments that steal their breath away.