Who Would You Be

We have lost several members of my High school Graduating Class, a couple even before we graduated and the question always is what would they be? A question Kenny Chesney touches on in his song, Who You’d Be Today!

Loosing someone we love is always hard, but when we loose someone we love at a young age, the pain is harder, the questions I think linger a little longer, and because the person is young we generally try to make sense of it. We grieve over our losses of course, but that grief becomes compounded by youth.

Grief is something that can be measured in the number of tears we cry, or even on how long we grieve for, because grief is not measurable and it’s ever changing. When we loose someone young though we are often reminded how short and fragile life is.

In an earlier story, I wrote about a middle school classmate who jumped the fence and died trying to get away from a bully. The boy who died had a heart condition and when the death of this young boy had what I am sure was a lasting impact on this boy. And I know the family asked the very question Kenny Chesney speculated on in his song Who You’d Be Today. It’s been over thirty years, but there’s no doubt his family still struggles with that question.

Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some stay for a while and leave footprints on our hearts. And we are never, ever the same.” Flavia Weedn

It’s never easing losing someone we love, whether they are Nine or Ninety Nine, but when that person is young there are more questions.

I have several friends who have lost a children, some of the children were 9 and others middle aged, but there is a deeper question, why? Why did I outlive my child? Why did they die? The women I know who have lost their children are all strong women of faith, and that helps. But that certainly does not mean they don’t grieve, it does mean they find comfort in their Faith, in the promise of being reunited with the children they love.

Losing a child happens in many different ways. There is the loss in the womb. There are cot deaths, accidents, epidemics, malignant diseases.”- Elaine Storkey

Each one of these friends have their own unique stories of loss, stories that I will not tell, because these stories are not mine, but they grieve, they feel pain, and yet they experience joy while still asking the question, who would you be today?

A question that is asked again and again, no matter the age of our lost loved ones, but an even more powerful question when that loved one happens to be a child, especially your child. No matter the age if someone outlives their child, there's going to be an emptiness, a whole in our hearts.

When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows.”

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

When a loved one, no matter the age passes on, we struggle with that loss. We question, we bargain and beg. We loose ourselves in memories, but for those of us who believe we find comfort, we pray, we cry, we struggle, we lean, and we find hope in the promise that we will see our loved ones again, free of the pains and tragedies of life.

Copyright ©️ Michelle R Kidwell

February.02.2023