Thursday, May 24, 2012

good gRief?

Grieving is generally done in 5 stages:

  denial, anger, bargaining,
depression....and finally acceptance.


i am certain that i am stuck in four of the five stages....

i didn't think i was such a life pansy....i seem to suck at overcoming some stuff. 
or maybe i am just addicted to being sad about stuff;
loss, abandonment, icky ouchies that happen
when you LIVE life and people you LOVE dont. 
(bitter edge of anger here)


i am actually questioning stage 5.  really?

anyhow....today i had a little tearful smile with a friend.  my friend lost a good friend about a week ago.  this good friend was a good guy living with some life baggage -- as all human beings tend to do. 

this good guy had some struggles, he died after consuming one particular struggle.  anyhow, left behind people who loved him, who appreciated him, who saw all the good stuff in this guy.

but the SMILE in the story is that this good guy did something really nice for someone about a month ago. 


it goes like this:

a young couple came into the station
 where this good guy worked. 
they had just had a baby
and were headed home from the hospital. 

home was about an hour away. 

they had to be in a
special hospital
kind of far
from "home".

  the young father needed to fill up with gas. 
 his credit card didn't work. 
something about his own life struggles. 
he was in a sad sorrow,
his young baby
and baby's mother in the car waiting. 

so this good guy
spent his own money
 to fill up this young couples car.

  he also gifted them some drinks
 and munchies for the road trip home.


the young man
overwhelmed
with the generosity
of our good guy
said "i will be back to pay you".

  the good guy said
"no worries,
enjoy your new baby,
it's my treat"

here we are
-- a month later,

 a week since 
good guys sad passing
from this world

the young man comes back
into the station,

an hour from home

asking when good guy will be at work


"will you give him this envelope?"


my good friend of the good guy
with tears in his eyes
told the young man
about his friends passing.

the young man broke

tears shed,
a hug between two strangers

both touched by the loss
which
left an emptyness
in their embrace.

but....

the envelope
inside was a bill - to pay back the debt

and a baby birth announcement


the impact of good guys kindness
will live on in the young mans son

the baby boy
middle name --
"good guy"

for in this strangers kindness
to these two young parents
trying to get home

left a legecy


baby boy "good guy" last name


i suppose the moral of this for me
is that
when you remember
the print of a person
in your life ---

at times
there 
can be
found 
a lot of good
among the gRief.

4 comments:

Andrea said...

That's a beautiful story!

Liz said...

Love the profoundness of this story!
Love you! ♥♥♥

Boy Mom said...

Thanks for the tender reminder of the goodness of all of us.

Michaela Stephens said...

That was really sweet. I'm sorry for your loss.

on marriage

'Will you, um, marry me?' I haven't seen you in weeks! You don't look happy or excited about the prospect of our marriage! You're asking me to give up my - my freedom, my joie de vivre for an institution that fails as often as it succeeds? And why should I marry you anyway? I mean, why do you wanna marry me? Besides some bourgeois desire to fulfill an ideal that society embeds in us from an early age to promote a consumer capitalist agenda?
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