Can't Even Imagine The Pain

I simply can't imagine what a parent must feel in the face of powerful forces that are going to impact one's son or daughter so directly--forces beyond one's ken and control. Hurricanes. Homelessness. Unemployment. Dislocation. Disease.

Death.

The level of pain and heartache that clearly commences in the wake of being unable to protect one's child has to have no comparison in this-world. I suspect that it is the greatest of all pains, the most momunmental of all tragedies--not to suffer a loss romantically, but to feel powerless and impotent in being able to protect those whom we have been blessed and given to care for: our children.

If it happens to us when is there not a time when we don't look back and wonder what we could have done differently. If only could easily become a way of life. If only I had left sooner. If only I had not stayed. If only I had called. If only: the life of regrets.

Perhaps because there is no other greater duty in life than to care for our children, it crushes our spirits like no other loss when we feel ourselves to have failed in some way, in that regard. Mothers and fathers alike suffer when faced with circumstances and/or conditions that they cannot overcome; forces that they as a simple human-being pale in comparison to; forces that verge on the godlike, the demonic, the catastrophic. Forces with names like Katrina and Rita. Names that sound like they could those of our friend, and yet names that leave us separated, disjointed, homeless, and grieving, no doubt, for lifetimes to come.

Every parent knows that they can fail at everything else, and as long as they feel themselves to have done their duty in caring for and protecting their child they are ok. You can fail at a career. You can lose a dream. You can be a fool in the eyes of the whole world for what you have done. Still, if your son or daughter feels loved and appreciated and cared for---and you know you did your best on their behalf--then that is all that matters. I said, then that is all that matters!

Unfortunately, for each of us, and for parents especially, there are forces beyond our powers of determination. Contrary to what some New Age gurus and wanna-be prophets proclaim--the complete powers of creation are not within our jurisdiction. We are as much prey to forces as we are predator to the same. We are as much those who must adapt and deal with unforeseen circumstances and conditions as those who define the circumstances and conditions. All of which leaves us vulnerable to being 'acted upon' in ways that we seem to have little say in. We are like the Biblical character Job, one who suffers gravely all of these tragic events and wonders why: 'God, what have I done? Have I displeased you in some way? Have I not held you up? Have I not been honourable in your eyes? Have I not loved enough? Why God? Why must I/we suffer so? Why is such ruin being visited upon us?'

That level of suffering and affliction seems to make us what we are, a philosophical-being--one prone to religion, susceptible to spiritual inquiry. Homo sapiens. One seminal moment in time--a personal and familial tragedy we could not control or contain--becomes the centerpiece of our psychological lives as we ask and ponder and pray and contemplate and seek and question and query everyday the nature of a single split second when everything changed. Everything.

The event that we cannot undo. The moment when we watched in horror as our son or daughter cried their last. A fate no parent should suffer. God... I can't even imagine the pain.