Catherine died yesterday afternoon. We'll be heading back to MA Tuesday, (redacted) Wednesday or Thursday.
Catherine was my friend's daughter. is it too soon to put her in the past tense?
i read this thing and i just sat and cried. i can't imagine this grief. two days ago my friend wrote to say the lung transplant they hoped for wasn't going to happen.
so i wasn't completely surprised. "Catherine is going to die in the hospital," my friend wrote to me. my friend does not sugar coat things, and she calls things what they are. she also does not go on about things.
but of all the joys in her life, it was clear that Catherine was her delight and joy. i met Catherine one night when we all went to dinner. she was a lovely, funny woman.
there is so little i can do for my friend. she and her husband will be tired and sad. i want to make sure they have hot dishes and i want them to be able to go for walks or go kayaking or do things of comfort.
they'll never be over it.
this child of theirs, whom they loved, whose life they cherished and nurtured, for whose future they held quiet dreams and wild hopes.
i want to go to them even though they are far away. i want to bring them casseroles and cookies, make them cups of tea, haul their boats, carry boxes, sweep corners.
i don't know what they want or need to comfort them in the face of this enormous thing.
2 comments:
They probably don't know, either. And there may be nothing that will comfort them really, except, cheesy as it sounds, time.
A truly awful, tragic thing, for a parent to watch a child die.
I'm sorry for this loss in your life.
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