As I drove home from my regular morning visit to the gym I saw 4 different “Estate Sale” signs. I know that there is a defacto “Garage Sale Season”, but I have never heard of Estate Sales being seasonal.

It occurred to me that each of those sales represents a house full of mementoes with a life-time of associated memories. In the course of a weekend the owners’ possessions will be disbursed like the windblown seeds from a dandelion.

It may be a kindness for an owner to have passed away before the sale, each item falling under the auctioneer’s gavel as a mere chattel. Imagine a couple’s pain as the rocker that saw small children fall to sleep in a mother’s arms is unceremoniously hauled off by a dealer who sees only new upholstery and profit in its possession. Think of the tears that might fall from the eyes of one who sees family photos, the ragged stuffed animals of a long-grown child, a rusted bicycle, a tarnished trophy… cast into a pile destined for the trash dump.

Christine’s 99-year-old father, Bill, returned to his Kansas City roots from his Florida retirement home. He was a refugee from Hurricane Irma. The accumulation of 75 years married to the love of his life was already culled to the barest of items. Things precious to him and few others. After nearly 3 months with us Christine made arrangements for him to acquire a wonderful 1-bedroom apartment in an assisted living community. It was complete with a living room, kitchen, and a balcony with a view. However, it was just empty space until 2 sturdy young men from Ikea spent 4 hours creating furnishings from flat boxes, and turned the space into a residence.

The place held no more charm for Bill than a motel until his few personal items were hung upon the walls. Pictures of 2 deceased children, a deceased brother’s picture, a 4-H lifetime achievement award, a “100,000 Mile Club” certificate from TWA with the watermark image of a 4-engine prop plane of 1950’s vintage, and of course images from a life lived well with his wife, now deceased. These and other similar items changed the sterile residence into a home. Bill often walks the perimeter of his apartment, stopping before each of these things which are the playback buttons of treasured moments, people, or places in time. Bill has spontaneously voiced his pride in his new home. In reality it is his pride in the old things that have a new place to share with him.

Someday, many of the “treasures” that Christine and I have accumulated will become the possessions of strangers, or merely add to the volume of a landfill. In any case, whatever their fate, memories are not included.

Peace Everyone. Pete

Once again, the media is saturated with the tragedy of children gunned down and parents wringing their hands in grief-stricken despair.
Most of us sit as observers of the unfolding drama. We are like those who sit ringside at a brutal cage-fight. We see the chaos unfolding within the cage, but we are safely separated from the real damage occurring within the enclosure. We see the emotions and the pain play out but remain insulated from anything more than a reflexive emotional flinch. When we walk away from the television our day remains undisturbed. The pain is theirs, not ours, and try as we might we cannot know the full depth of the loss… UNLESS, one has endured the suffering of having lost a child.

Some of you who are reading this have lost a child, and I apologize in advance for the inadequacy of what I am presenting. I have not lost a child, but I have been present at the passing of a grandchild and witnessed my child thus endure that loss.

There was another occasion when I found myself in a circumstance that gave me the smallest and briefest inkling of what a parent’s grief might feel like. Years ago, Christine and I were actors in a community theater presentation of “A Christmas Carol”. I was Bob Cratchit and Christine played my wife, Martha. We fell easily into our roles, to the point that the death of Tiny Tim became larger than life for us on stage. “Bob” had returned home from visiting “Tim’s” grave. On script, “Martha” observed, “Your walk seemed a bit longer than usual.” I understood her meaning and with a slight hesitation I replied, “Yes, I went to see him today.” In a real flood of emotion, I forced myself to continue. “It is such a lovely place, and as soon as I arrived I wished that you had been there with me.”
It was too much for me. No longer acting, my head bent toward the table and my hands extended flat on either side of a teapot. My fingers contracted and drew the tablecloth into my fists. The sugar and cream moved upon the table. Christine’s hand found my shoulder as she leaned over me with real concern. A tear drop fell from my eye, darkening the tablecloth as the second, third, and countless other tears, mine and hers, fell to the table. I became dimly aware of the sobs which now came from the “Cratchit children” who were gathered around us. I knew I was supposed to say something, but the words that I had practiced were lost. From the deepest pain in my soul I looked into my wife’s eyes and I cried off script, “I just miss my child… I miss him so much!”. She, and I and the children all found one another and embraced in sudden and unrehearsed anguish as the lights dimmed.

I stood from the table and gazed upon the tear-filled eyes of my “family” wondering at what had just occurred. When Christine and I left the table, we left behind the ghosts of Bob and Martha Cratchit. We left behind their pain.

Our intention that night had been to act out roles in a community theater presentation of “A Christmas Carol”. But for those few moments at the table, we were parents who mourned the loss of their child… parents who felt the pain of every other parent who has lost a child. For just a moment we had an insight into that unspeakable, searing, suffocating pain.

The loss of a child is a horror beyond the capacity of the English language to describe. There are words to identify other family losses… widow, widower, and orphan, but there is no single word for a parent who has lost a child.

Peace. Pete Schloss

Years ago, during a Lake Michigan sailing passage from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to Washington Island Wisconsin, Christine and I encountered a sudden gale force storm. What had started for the two of us as an idyllic 8-hour sail quickly deteriorated into a terrifying cacophony of wind, waives, and lightning. The anchor broke free of its mount on the bow and threatened to hole the side of the hull. I slid along the deck going forward with line in my teeth while Christine struggled against the tiller. The bow alternately rose and fell against the crashing waves… one moment I was 8 feet above the water, the next submerged. I succeeded in securing the anchor and reversed my crawl to the cockpit aft. Shaken by the experience I asked Christine if she had identification zipped in her fowl weather jacket. I was serious, and she knew it.

On our marine radio we monitored a Coast Guard rescue of a vessel that had foundered within a couple of miles of us. We had been towing our dingy, but the wind and waves had capsized the 9-foot rowboat… I had to cut it loose. Eventually we were in sight of the harbor entrance, protected waters and land.

On shore but still shaken, my wife and I proceeded to the marina restaurant and saw in the distance a rainbow which appropriately marked the end of our terror. We noted that the other patrons spoke of the storm as a “pleasant distraction”. I will ever remember the contrast between the “distraction” for those ashore and the struggle for us on the water.

This stands as a metaphor that there are those among us who live the same day but are instead burdened by vastly different experiences… days filled with hunger, poverty, and desperation. The rainbow never appears on their side of the storm.

Peace Everyone. Pete