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Some thing just don’t bear too much thinking about.

A week or two ago a couple about my age came to my counter and said they had several things they wanted to have framed. The first were 2 posters, and as I took measurements and discussed designs with them I noticed that the woman seemed distracted and restless in a way that spoke to me of distress. I kind of dialed down my usual chatty nature in response to whatever was upsetting her.

When we came to the third item to be framed she pulled out several pieces of paper and explained that she wanted them in a 3-opening collage frame. As I laid them out to get measurements I saw that they were pages from a program from a memorial service for someone who had died. I asked no questions as I saw the bleak expression in her eyes. Let’s get through this fast, I thought  and let them get on their way. As I began estimating mat widths and entering numbers in the computer the woman suddenly said, "That was my boy!"

I looked up, mouth agape. She was standing rigid, one hand over her mouth as if the words had simply lept out of her of their own volition. I heard her husband say gently, tiredly, "Honey…" as if concerned that she was bothering me with her pain. "Oh, Lord!" was all I could whisper, and suddenly I leaned across the counter. This total stranger and I embraced fiercely and each sobbed on the other’s shoulder, mother to mother.

"I’m sorry, I"m sorry" she said after a minute.
"You’re sorry?" I replied. "You don’t have anything to be sorry for! " I ducked into the frame shop and grabbed tissues for both of us, because my face was wet and my hands were shaking.

"I’m alright now" she assured me. "It’s just- I"m alright."
"If you’re ready to finish this now, that’s fine" I said, tucking my tissue in my apron pocket and touching her arm, "but don’t you ever let anyone tell you that you have to be Ok now; that when a certain time has passed, you’re supposed to be alright with this. I- " my voice broke and I grabbed for my tissue again, "I don’t know how anyone is ever alright when this happens!"

The order was finished and with a final touch on the shoulder, I sent them on their way. I picked up the pages from the memorial service, held a week earlier for their 22 year old son, and gently stored them in a protective sleeve until we could begin the job of preserving them. Then I leaned against the work table and grabbed for my prayer box.
A few weeks earlier I had found the small sterling silver box on sale. It came with a little tag that said you are supposed to whisper your prayers into it and then wear them close to your heart, but really, I just bought it because it was pretty. Since then, however, I find myself just holding it in my hand when a the need arises. My prayers usually consist of just a single word or two- "Thank you" or sometimes, "Help".

Now I held it tightly and thought of my own boy, drawing his cartoons, studying his chemistry and dreaming his dreams at college. Emily Dickenson’s words, "…too huge, too hopeless to conceive…" exactly described any attempt to contemplate what I would do, how I would go on, if something happened to that child of my heart, and something wild inside me threatened to break free at just the thought. So instead I thought of the people who had just left my counter.
As they’d walked slowly away, clearly aged by what they had been going through, I had seen the husband reach out- more just twist his wrist so he could brush his wife’s fingers with the edge of his own. In response she curled 2 of her fingers around his. That small touch, that tiny sign of love and comfort struggling to rise through the grief, gave me hope.

Some things seem too great to be borne. When we’re young, the things we think are unbearable- a breakup with a boyfriend, a test failed- seem so trivial compared to the griefs that life all too often serves up in later years. They say that one finds the strength somehow when it is needed. I hope this is so. I hope that the family I met have the strength to get through, if not ever over, the loss they have suffered. In my mind, so blessed with only small burdens thus far, I cannot fathom how this could be, but it is my fervent prayer.

Send help. Please.