Choirs of Angels



I can't stop thinking about those children, their families, in Connecticut.  You leave your child in school, wave good-bye, see them walk down the hallway and then you get a phone call that shatters your world.  People talk about gun control.  I believe when someone makes up their mind to do evil, no amount of laws will stop them.  They will find a way to procure the weapon, one way or another.  It is not the weapon, it is the evil operating the weapon and evil is insidious, sneaky, intelligent in a bloody, vicious way.  I read where one of the teachers read to her students because she wanted her voice to be the last thing they heard, what a special human being.  Others locked doors, hid children in closets, anywhere they possibly could, trying to keep them safe.  Evil walked those halls, but there were also angels close by. 

When I first heard about the children, an image popped into my mind of angels singing.  A choir of angels singing them home.  At any time of the year, a tragedy like this would be horrific.  Happening during this most special season, a season we celebrate peace, joy, love, the birth of someone who changed the course of history, makes it even more horrific.  To lose a loved one is hurtful enough.  To lose them through violence, knowing they died by someone's hand, by someone's choice, adds insult to injury.  Impossible to process, impossible to accept, work through, acknowledge.  If it is someone who lived their life, who you can at least say, well, they died doing what they loved, they lived their life, that fact helps to assuage the pain of their death, a little.  But when it is a child, oh, Father in Heaven, it is excruciating.  No matter what you do, think, feel, believe, no matter how strong your faith is, and during times like these what keeps your remaining sanity intact is your faith, what anyone says to you, the only thing you hear in your head is your voice screaming why.

Life is such a gift, we take it for granted everyday.  Simple, everyday, humble acts are repeated by rote, no importance given to them.  They are mundane, repetitive.  We get up, brush our teeth, pour the cereal, wake the kids up.  Yet in retrospect, they are little gifts we fail to acknowledge.  With just one bloody gesture, decision, those moments are forever wiped from our lives.  Gone.  We are left wondering why.  Going back to that saying of how we only see bits and pieces of the picture, God sees the entire picture and it is glorious, it is hard to find how something like this fits into the picture, but we must have faith that, somehow, it does. You cannot make sense of something like this, you can only go on, make your way sometimes on faith alone.  Faith and memories.  Bittersweet memories forever tinged by what once was, what could have been.

Hug your loved ones, tell them you love them.  Even though they roll their eyes and sigh, inside they love knowing they are cared about, loved, cherished.  The other day watching Elie Wiesel on Oprah, he said something that has stuck with me and is oh, so true, "the opposite of love isn't hate, it is indifference."  Knowing that you matter to someone is, I believe, one of life's greatest presents.  Make sure the people in your life know they matter to you.  Life is too short to spend one second of it angry, bitter.  Fill it with laughter, silly times, hugs, love, joy.  Fill it with faith.  In the end, memories and faith get you through.

My weekend plans are to get the Christmas tree, my much-loved Fairy Godmother Ruby is visiting for dinner and tree decorating.  I am baking Snickerdoodles for her, they are her favorite cookies.  I love spoiling her, just as she spoils me.  She is one of the many joys in my life.  I am grateful for each and every one of them.  Decorating the tree is always a special time, you remember past Christmases, where you were when you bought an ornament, or who gave you a special one.  The tragedy in Connecticut will make today bittersweet, as we decorate my tree, how many families are missing their little ones, getting ready for that final good-bye in this life.

Hug your loved ones, be kind, be safe.  Light a candle, say a prayer for those children and the adults who died trying to protect them, for all the families, loved ones touched by this tragedy, for all the responders when the call went out.  Above all, have faith, have faith, have faith.

I know choirs of angels were singing those little souls home to Heaven, yesterday. But before singing, I know those angels were weeping.