Jonah

Dear Jonah,

Well, difficult as it is to believe, today marks ten years since you died.

Ten years. It’s on days like these that I wonder about the human impulse to make things fit into neat containers. It’s not that I’m not deeply affected by this anniversary. I am. But why should ten years be any more consequential than nine or eleven? Oh well. Somehow it just is.

I remember when I was in college, I’d begun bracing myself for turning twenty-one. That was going to be a big one, the transition from childhood to true adulthood. But then I turned twenty and, without any warning whatsoever, got thrown for an immense loop. My teens were over. Why didn’t anyone tell me this would be bigger than twenty-one?

Dear Jonah,

A few weeks ago, I cried for you – first time in a long, long while. I’d come across a story that captured a sentiment I often think about. Namely, the fear that one’s lost child will be forgotten when we ourselves are gone.

I imagine that many parents whose children have become memories wonder about this. But who would blame us?

Why do we bring children into the world anyway? We delight in witnessing life that’s come from us and in watching that life grow and thrive. Wanting a child’s years to extend beyond a parent’s is natural. For those of us whose kids have died, how many want the memory of their child to outlast us? I suspect that my own motivation for helping to create a foundation in your name is wrapped up in this need to see you outlast me.

Which brings me to the story I found. I’d never read or heard it before, even though an internet search found that it’s often used in sermons. Alas, there’s no attribution so I offer it with gratitude to whomever wrote it.

It’s called “The Art Auction.”

Dear Jonah,

On February 14, 2009, you turned 19. Nineteen days later, you were gone.

Careful plans had been orchestrated to prepare for your first birthday away from home. Katie and Mark were with you at UB and took you out for a birthday dinner, but Ellen, Aiden and I were in Washington, DC, so a long-distance celebration was on order. What transpired was fun, and far more poignant – owing to your leaving us – than we’d thought it would be.

The first gift arrived in your UB mailslot — a slackline. Something you had fallen in love with at Kutz Camp, you were eager for springtime to arrive when you could attach it between two trees and do some close-to-the-ground tightrope walking on campus. Late in March, the slackline came back home. It’s still waiting for us to find two trees and willing volunteers to enjoy it on your behalf. We’ll get there.