I can’t help it. Call me a child…. call me an idealist. I just wish the world was fair.
I’ve heard a lot of bad news…. a lot of truly heart-breaking news lately. And the words that reverberate through my brain?
It just isn’t fair.
A friend of mine lost her husband last week. Tragically. He was hit by a car. He was young.
He was the love of her life.
You can’t see a picture of the two of them without feeling her love. It was in her eyes….in the way she stands by him…. how her smile reaches her heart. And now…. he’s not here. And she is left alone with two teens, picking up the pieces of what was their picture-perfect life.
So….really? Why is this any less fair than any of the tragedies we’ve been bombarded with lately? Maybe it isn’t…. but I can’t help but feel as though she deserved a different story. This chapter wasn’t supposed to be written.
You see, my friend is a remarkable human being – the kind that makes you want to be better. She is joy and love, teaching and giving, faith and courage. Her life has been dedicated to doing the right thing, to donating her time to helping others – to truly making the world around her just.better. As a professional photographer, she has a gift for taking pictures of children – capturing the smile, the moment (as she did here with Cooper). She is patient and has dedicated days of her life to charities supporting children here and in other countries. She is an ‘I’ll-do-anything-for-you-kind-of-friend’. She. Is. Just. Good. People.
Shouldn’t she have sweat equity wrapping her in a bubble of goodness? Shouldn’t the good she does every single day have been enough to insulate her from this type of heart break? Now, that would have been fair. And even though I know in my heart that it just doesn’t work that way, I can’t shake the notion that it SHOULD. I can’t help but wish I could go back in time a week and somehow prevent this tragedy from happening.
And yet, while I moan from the sidelines about the unfairness of it all – from her – I am witnessing only that same strength of character, that very same faith and courage as it buoys her through this time. And I am amazed.
In times that are both good and astonishingly hard – she is, as I have always known her – Grace and Beauty.
The photo you see there is one my friend took just a few months ago…. She has captured joy in my life…. and I hope she will someday re-capture the joy I know is in her heart.
Leave a Reply