Recently, as a distraction, I took one of those BuzzFeed quizzes. This one was “Which country should you have been born in?” My result was England. “You like to be in control and maintain appearances,” the description underneath the photo of Big Ben so succinctly spelled out. It got a small laugh out of me, because I have been known to be a bit of an Anglophile at times, and that part about control may have come up once or twice before….
Richard and Andreas, Summer 2013
However, if there is anything that I have learned this April, an April in which we lost my husband’s 21-year-old son Richard, an April which has shaken us to the core, is that so much of life is completely out of our control. There are no guarantees. We only can control our own actions, living our best – and loving our best – at any given moment. Live and trust.
Living and trusting do not come easily right now. The world looks vastly different and much more frightening to me than it did a month ago. While we contemplate how things could have gone so wrong, and as we learn about the extent of the darkness and addiction that overtook this brilliant and talented young man, I can’t help but wonder how to protect our little son from the hazards that no doubt lie ahead of him. How do we properly equip him to thrive in a world that is more pressure-filled and fast-paced than ever, a world that values scope rather than depth, a world that seems to leave very little room for the quiet space that the spirit needs in order to grow bright and strong? A world where everything (both good and completely ruinous) is just a few keystrokes away?
We are devoid of answers.
I must believe, however, that hidden in the maze of the unanswered questions and sadness lies something that will eventually give us peace and hope and a way to return to living and trusting again.
In the meantime, our two-year-old gives his stuffed Grinch a hug – the Grinch was a gift from Richard – and says “Is the Grinch Richard? I’m going to give Richard a hug.” We too hold and hug Richard in our hearts. We always will.
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