Lost and Found

It's amazing how some things change just when we thought it would stay the same forever. Most of the time, it shocks us to the point of hurting ourselves more by thinking of the sweet, tender moments never to be recaptured.

I felt a tremendous loss when a very close friend lost a mother to cancer. It was an unthinkable thought. And I admire her for the strength and courage she had shown through the whole ordeal. How can one ever stand burying a parent?

Looking at my grandparents, I see a life of growing old together--and a child lost. I was just nine when my uncle died and yet, I still feel the emptiness every time I think of him. Thirteen years, not even fifty, won't ever heal this wound. How can parents stand the thought of never seeing their child again?

Breaking up with someone was painful enough for a friend. Months later, he lost her to rape and murder. Life is hell with all the what-ifs and what-could-have-beens. How can a lover bury three years worth of memories and dashed hopes of reconciliation? And how come he was so willing to die for love but not live for it?

My sisters and I were told about him as soon as we were old enough to understand--he came into this world a stillborn. I never held his hand but somehow I always think of him. How can I miss a brother I never even met?

But life is nothing but borrowed time. We really don't have a say when God wants it back. We need only to live this gift and at the same time, endure the loss of it. Because in the blinding glare of darkness and the defeaning silence that meet our questions, there is the promise of paradise where the days are sweetest, where we all see lost loved ones again and this time, live together forever in His glory.

(Originally posted at The Kookie Jar.)