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May 04, 2005
Prairie Fire
It happens in the middle of the night. It is abrupt and startling. I feel it moving through me like a prairie fire whipped by northern winds. My skin is cold and clammy and I realize that my pajamas are thoroughly soaked in sweat. I sit up; my hands shake uncontrollably.
"What's wrong?" says Karen.
My wife and I are so finely tuned that though it's three in the morning and though she was fast asleep a second ago, Karen immediately senses the emotional shift in me, in the very atmosphere.
"Anxiety," I respond lamely.
"About what?"
"Ariel. I feel so far removed from him."
"In what way?"
"I'm coming to accept the fact that his absence is normal. It can never be normal. It should always be completely wrong, completely unacceptable."
Karen groans. It's a sound akin to brute animal pain. Karen, who is normally so controlled in public, becomes defenseless when we are alone. She lets herself cry. She allows her vulnerabilities full voice. There is no pain as great as a mother's pain. Not even a father's pain. Karen reaches over and touches my back -- a touch light as a feather.
"Can Ariel hear us, can he hear what we're saying right now?" she queries the universe.
I shake my head from side to side. I hunch over, hold my head in my hands as if it might implode.
I spend the rest of the night on the couch in our bedroom trying to reimagine how special it was to be Ariel's father. It is a life's work.
For the observant Jew there is no loneliness like going alone to shul, sitting alone in shul, walking home alone. It is mild torture watching other fathers with their sons. The way they smile as they kibbitz, as they discuss what's going on in school, as they ponder some particularly difficult section of Talmud; they walk along, not truly realizing how blessed they are.
For the past few days we've had a visitor from New York, a fine young man who graduates from Yeshiva University this June. He went to shul (early minyan) with me, davened by my side, walked home with me. For those brief moments, I was reminded of what's been lost, but it also occurred to me that there is still much to gain.
Karen adds: It would not be my choice to reveal my nocturnal keening, but the deed is done. I have a penchant for finding comfort in mysterious connections that are both obvious and hidden at the same time. This afternoon I was brought to tears while driving listening to Rabbi Fohrman's tape, "Paradise Lost, from Eden to the Great Flood." He offers an elegant inisight that crystallizes the magnificance and economy of Lashon HaKodesh. The word for a mourner is Avel, and has the same shoresh, or root as the word Aval, which means never the less. The connection epitimizes my predicament. I mourn, but NEVER THE LESS, although I have no explanation, no reason for Ariel's death, I have to go on with life. How could I not see this linguisitic connection before? Now it seems so obvious, so pure in its simplicity. Nevertheless...
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at May 4, 2005 11:19 AM
Comments
Seraphic Secret is private property, that's right, it's an extension of our home, and as such, Karen and I have instituted two Seraphic Rules and we ask commentors to act respectfully.
1. No profanity.2. No Israel bashing. We debate, we discuss, we are respectful. You know what Israel bashing is. The world is full of it. Seraphic Secret is one of the few places in the world that will not tolerate this form of anti-Semitism. That's it. Break either of these rules and you will be banned.
Already knowing your writing style, I'll have to look out for the turn of phrase "prairie fire whipped by northern winds" in the next Hebrew Kid adventure.
The last sentence of your post is most poignant, and reveals a strong sense of clarity...and hope...and assuredness.
Posted by: Pearl at May 4, 2005 12:28 PM
I identify so strongly with so much of what both of you wrote here.
The strange feeling, bordering on guilt, that I get when I realize that I have, in many ways, "adjusted" to Tiimi's death. I agree, Karen, life goes on, but when I stop to think about it, it seems surreal that my grief and my everyday life and concerns can cohabit in one body and one soul.
Robert, I do know how you feel about going to and coming back from shul alone. Although I have, thank God, other daughters, Timmi was the only one who really wanted to come to the shul/community that Daniel and I belong to, except sometimes on the High Holidays. Of course, you don't have Ariel even for that, and I still have some hope of convincing one or more of my daughters to come with me more often, so in that sense your loss is more final. Still, when I'm there, the memories of the times we sat together - when she was healthy, she sat in a chair, and when she was in worse shape, I brought her in a wheelchair - make me feel sometimes almost like I'm sitting with her ghost. And seeing other mothers and daughters together, well... it's as you said.
Posted by: With Love at May 6, 2005 08:37 AM