As we left Mass today, an elderly couple stopped to greet us and look at the baby. The wife was the grandmotherly type it is always a blessing to encounter--a mother who appreciates a large family and wants to share an uplifting word and a smile for the children. As I was thanking her, she reminded me to be grateful for every single day with the kids. Faltering, she was overcome with sorrow, confiding that her fifty-two year old son had died of lung cancer only a year ago, leaving her heartbroken. I put an arm around her, and we remained talking for quite some time, two mothers united in understanding, our shared experience teaching me that her son was really just a little boy like mine.
This sorrowful mother has been in my thoughts all day, and, as we continue to remember the mothers from our own circle of friends who suffered so deeply this week, I hope you will say a prayer for her and for her son Robert. My friend, Karen Edmisten, has represented in words the deepest and tenderest feelings of a mother's heart: A Mother's Grief and Surrender.
Fifty-two is still just a baby to a mother's heart. Thank you, Alice, I will pray for her this morning.
Posted by: Suzanne Temple | October 30, 2006 at 07:07 AM
I really can't imagine any greater loss. I have and will continue to pray for all the mothers who have lost children.
Posted by: Jennifer | October 30, 2006 at 07:37 AM
Alice:
You have the gift of encouragement. What a blessing for that dear woman, that she ran into you and your beautiful children. I will say a prayer for her.
Posted by: Mary Beth P | October 30, 2006 at 08:35 AM
Oh that made me cry. Dh and I were saying this wknd that people so misled us as new parents. You get the message that its harder at the start and then gets progressively easier as kids grow more older.
Physically perhaps. Emotionally no.
Posted by: Kim | October 30, 2006 at 10:33 AM
Oh, Alice, thank you for the kind mention, but most of all, I wanted to say what a blessing you were to that grieving mother. God put you in one another's paths yesterday.
A friend of ours lost his grown son last spring, and he is still grieving so much. We never stop loving our "babies" and there is no greater loss than that of a child ....
You are such a beautiful soul.
Posted by: Karen E. | October 30, 2006 at 11:26 AM
Oh, Alice..you never fail to be a such an angel to so many of us. I can't imagine her pain..need to go hug my own ds very close and tell him I love him. With tears in my eyes...
Posted by: Marybeth | October 30, 2006 at 05:16 PM