123 - Sometimes it's not as easy as 1-2-3.

On stories

Aug 17, 2025

Welcome back! (Or welcome!)

Last week I listed several grief memoirs. Caryn added several in a comment. Check them out, too.

That’s a lot.

I heard from one of you this week about a journey of anticipatory grief. (That what we call it when we know that someone we love is dying within weeks. Or their mind is leaving before their body dies.)

As I listened to the daily and weekly choices, the sense of timing, the awareness that death is coming closer, a few things came to mind.

That is hard. No question. No “at least.” No “but.” Watching people dying is hard. And when we love them and have stories with them, it’s harder.

I’m grateful you are aware. Too often, people are convinced that things will turn around. As a spouse said to me this week, “Yesterday was so good. The younger grandkids came up. We thought this might be a turning point.” It was, of course, a turning point. It was the last good day.

What I think about often is that there will always be a last time we hold hands, a next to the last day we talk. We seldom know when that is.

I’m grateful you wrote about it. I talked a couple weeks ago about different kinds of grief writing. Memoir is one. So is writing a friend an account of what is happening. It invites someone else into our head and heart. It also lets us figure out what is in our own head and heart. Often this writing isn’t for sympathy. It’s for clarity.

In Prayer in the Night, Tish Harrison Warren quotes a sermon: “You cannot trust God to keep bad things from happening to you.” Parents die, careers change, trees fall. The promise of God isn’t the absence of what we think are bad things, the promise is the presence.

As you (and you and you) are traveling literal and figurative journeys this week, I ask for an awareness of God’s presence.

Small choices. A story.

This week, I chose to not go to a funeral. We had Ben over instead.

The funeral was for a guy I’ve known for nearly twenty years. We’d have short conversations. He asked good questions about faith that often felt like they had an agenda but didn’t. He wanted to understand. (Okay. At least some of the time he had an agenda.)

I met him at the last church I served. And then I saw him often at the hospital. He transported people to tests. I go everywhere. Our paths often crossed. Sometimes we’d talk. Sometimes I’d say, “I’m heading to a death.”

And then I saw him a couple times IN the hospital. We finally had time to talk. When people who are a little skeptical about structures and hopeful about Jesus find they don’t have to worry about what they are saying, the conversation is refreshing.

The second time, though was after the tests finally discovered that the initial problem wasn’t the only problem. He was fading.

He talked, I talked, we both had tears, I talked with God. And then he said, as part of the conversation, “a little boy’s heart.” That’s what he wanted as he was finishing his life. A little boy’s heart with God.

He died a couple days after that conversation.

His funeral was yesterday. I was working second shift at the hospital. We could have gone. But our usual day with Ben this week hadn’t happened as usual. So we picked him up, went to the mall to walk and play and eat. We came home and he helped me sort out the sockets that had fallen out of their box. We drove in the parked car. We pressed a very long snake with black and pink variegated Play-Doh We sat on the sofa and ate cookies and watched Handyman Hal. With Nancy’s help he went to bed. I went to work.

Ben and I and Terry. And little boys’ hearts.

I’m telling you this to let you know that it’s okay to live out someone’s wishes instead of going to someone’s service. It’s also okay to go to someone’s service. I’ve done both.

It’s also okay, in the middle of all the attempts to rile up our hearts and minds with breaking news to make simple choices. To be with one or two people at a time, living life.

A couple resources.

I’ve talked about Clarissa Moll here before and her resources. Last week I listened to this conversation about her grieving and writing and family. If you are helping other people, particularly people whose spouses have died, this may be a helpful conversation.
Episode 330: Clarissa Moll — Shifting Culture (shiftingculturepodcast.com)

Five years ago, I created a journal for Advent. It was the first Christmas of COVID and many of us were wrestling with all the loss. The next year, I updated it to be useful for reflecting on a year. There are daily questions to invite reflection on the year. If you are thinking about an Advent journal for yourself or for a group, check out Giving the Year Meaning: A Healing Journal for Advent.