Empathy for Linda’s loss

A hush fell over the office Tuesday. Co-workers whispered the reason for the silence to each other. As the minutes of silence and waiting stretched into infinity, many walked over and stared at the closed door to the conference room. We longed to be able to reach through the door and comfort our co-worker who was being told that her son had had a fatal accident that morning.
In the back of our minds that morning we knew that the knock at the door, the call from the hospital or the police can come at any time for any of us and our whole world will change permanently. We plan for a full life time with our loved ones and hope we are not the one pulled aside. To have one we knew and worked with every day pulled aside left us fighting tears. Through conversations with her we knew her son.
Silent and subdued against the specter of death, we stepped back from our projects knowing that although work pays the bills, and occupies our days, it will never be as important as the ones we love. In the spaces and breaks of our work day, that reality seeps out when we talk about our daughter’s pageant, our son’s performance in the school play, how cute the grandchildren looked dressed up for Halloween, prom and homecoming.
Over the years the mother in that room talked about her children. This spring she had talked about this son as a proud mother of a high school graduate. She brought and shared the colorful scrapbook she had done for him.
From birth to graduation the scrapbook gave a joyful glimpse at the story of his life. The baby, the grinning child surrounded by presents and cakes, the strong, healthy young man ready to graduate.
During a visit to his grandparent’s in Oyster Creek, Texas, his grandmother taught him to fish. After another trip, his mother came back with stories of him feeding an alligator in the wild. A scary thought, but just the sort of thing an normal woodsy, teenager would do.
And he did love the woods and nature. Snapshots provided glimpses of him hunting and fishing.
But he also enjoyed construction. This spring he not only graduated from high school, but he also received a certificate of proficiency in basic welding technology from South Arkansas Community College and a scholarship to continue his studies. His mother brought the college catalog to work and talked about the classes he needed.
At home, he used his hands-on skills to help his dad build a new family home.
We did not know the son as well as we knew the mother and her quiet pride and determination to bring-up a solid citizen. “She kept those boys in church,” co-workers said repeatedly.
She spent 19 years pointing him in the right direction, getting him involved with the right kind of activities. “She kept close to him,” another said.
He had his whole life ahead of him, but a slippery road and the whole world changed.
Those of us who knew of him through his mother’s love, felt the world shift and we mourned with her silently, staring at the closed door of her loss, knowing that no matter how much we wanted to do so, we could not change what had happened.