Mary Potter Kenyon

We put on a pot of tea, a necessity between these two writing friends. Wecould no more imagine writing without this hot sustenance than we couldwithout pen and paper. We sat at the table to talk shop, sort through ournotes, and make plans for the book. Then we settled down in the sunroom,giggling a little at the unexpected absurdity of our activity, editingwithin arm__ reach of each other, like toddlers at parallel play.

What were you going to make for Christmas dinner?_ one of my older children asked in a very reasonable tone. I cleared my throat, but couldn__ speak. There was no real explanation for my behavior. I__ been so intent on getting through this first Christmas without David. I__ found new rituals to replace the old, wrapped gifts, and even made cutout sugar cookies. I__ modified Christmas in order to endure it. What I hadn__ done was plan on or prepare a Christmas meal. Everyone waslooking at me expectantly by this point, including my sweet, hungrygrandchildren.__ forgot all about Christmas dinner,_ I finally admitted. No one batted an eye.

I held back from seeing Jacob much during those weeks. He wanted only his mother, and I wasn__ sure I could handle seeing him like that. I stopped by to pick up his siblings and take them away, but I rarely went inside the house. After several days of this, I knew I must face the sight that my daughter faced daily. Inside, I approached the couch tentatively.Would I upset him? A few times when I had visited, he__ hidden his facein a blanket. I reached out hesitantly, touching his thin arm, the skin hot and dry as paper. He didn__ move, but I could see the rise and fall of his swollen chest. Suddenly, my legs gave way, and I dropped to my knees in front of the grandson that I loved so dearly. My hand shook as I lifted it to his soft, fuzzy head. I felt as though I was in the presence of someone very holy.__ love you,_ I whispered, and when he didn__ respond, an even softer whisper, __ell Grandpa that I love him and miss him._ And then, with a groan, __ear God, don__ let him suffer.

What were you going to make for Christmas dinner?_ one of myolder children asked in a very reasonable tone. I cleared my throat,but couldn__ speak. There was no real explanation for my behavior. I__ been so intent on getting through this first Christmas without David. I__ found new rituals to replace the old, wrapped gifts, and even made cutout sugar cookies. I__ modified Christmas in order to endure it. What I hadn__ done was plan on or prepare a Christmas meal. Everyone was looking at me expectantly by this point, including my sweet, hungry grandchildren.__ forgot all about Christmas dinner,_ I finally admitted. No one batted an eye.

You have no idea how well you are doing,_ John complimented mejust a few minutes after he mentioned the Christmas card. What did that mean: That I was doing well? That I__ come to a family gathering? That I__ remembered to bring food? That I was dressed, and my hair combed? That I was wearing shoes? I wasn__ sure, but maybe just making an appearance at a family event meant I was handling things well.

I often wondered after David__ death: Had they known something then? Did their very souls recognize each other? Did Jacob, closer to God than anyone else I knew, somehow sense this was the last time he would see his grandpa? Hadthere been a message to the little boy in David__ long-held gaze? Did these two people__he six-year-old boy and the sixty-year-old man_ realize something the rest of us didn__?

That evening I sat across from Jeremy Bulloch and Jacob at the dinner table. I watched as Jeremy, who seemed to speak Jacob__ silent language fluently, drummed his fingers up and down on the edge of the table, as if playing a piano. A delighted Jacob mimicked the actor__ actions. My throat filled with tears. I met Ben__ eyes across the table, where he sat straight with pride next to his son. He was enjoying the show just as much as I was. Jacob was in his element, interacting with an actor from his favorite movie. The other men at the table were part of the set: Mike, the owner of the comic book store, who had made the entire thing possible, and the Mandalorin Mercs, new friends of the little boy who hadbecome one of their own, a comrade in distress.

You who have never __een there_ in the throes of grief, have no idea what is going on inside the head of the grieving spouse: the scatteredthoughts, the constant worry that we will forget something or someone in our fog-induced state, that strange feeling of not quite __eing all there_ when out in social situations, the pall that covers everything, like a cloak of sadness that never lifts.

Don__ you believe that Jacob can be healed?_ some persisted, pressuringElizabeth to believe__ust believe__nd Jacob would be healed. Theunderlying message was that Elizabeth__ faith was not strong enough to save her son. I remembered then the same kind of statements David and I had heard when he was undergoing cancer treatment, when several well-intentioned people informed David that all he had to do to rid his body of cancer was to believe he was healed. I__ resented the implications then, and I resented them for my daughter now. People die. Goodpeople like David die too young, and innocent little children die, and thestrongest faith in the world cannot keep anyone on this earth forever. Ifonly the same Christians professing their faith in healing could clearlysee the flip side of that faith, that earth was not where we ultimately belonged.If Jacob died, he would be going Home.

In the midst of the darkness of loss, I found light. Admittedly, in those first weeks, it might have been but a single small spark I sensed deep inside of me, but that spark guided me in the twisted, dark journey of grief. As I stumbled over the roots of hopelessness and despair, that light grew to illuminate my path, a path I sometimes felt very alone on. At some point in the journey I__ turned around, and there was God.That is grace.

The whole encounter was surreal. No one had mentioned cancer. I hadn__ requested special treatment for Jacob. Yet he__ just nabbed a private meeting with an actor from his favorite movie. I would later ask Mike, the comic book store owner, what had prompted him to invite Jacob to the supper and a private meeting with Mr. Bulloch.__t was Jeremy at the door. He recognized something in Jacob. Jeremyis a cancer survivor.

Tonight I attend my thirty-fifth high school reunion with some trepidation.I have not seen most of these former classmates for thirty-some years. I am not the same young girl they knew in high school. What they cannot know, what I am just realizing myself, is that I am not even the same person I was two years ago.

Can you remember another time when your chest felt like this?__y fingers splayed across my aching chest as I carefully pondered herquestion. Then I nodded vigorously as I remembered. Tears streamed down my cheeks unchecked as I whispered hoarsely, __es, I do remember.After my husband died, it hurt like this. My chest felt full and heavy, and I thought then, Oh, this is what it feels like to have your heart break.

Initially, after David__ diagnosis, I would cringe when I readbooks or articles by cancer survivors who stated that cancer hadbeen a gift in their lives. How could all that David endured beviewed as a gift? The invasive surgery, the weeks of chemotherapyand radiation: a gift?Yet, after the cancer, David would often reach for my hand andsay, __f it is cancer that is responsible for our new relationship, thenit was all worth it._ And I__ reluctantly agree that cancer had been agift in our lives. We__ both seen the other alternative: patients andsurvivors who had become bitter and angry, and neither one of uswanted to become that.

Perhaps one of the more creative promotions of all time wasin 1969, when a marketer with the Procter & Gamble Companycame up with the idea of giving away goldfish with each purchaseof a king-size box of Spic and Span.