Enough

Today I’ll finally take down the last of the winter decorations, the antique sled by the front door and the evergreen garland trimming the garage. They could have come down weeks ago, I suppose, along with the Christmas tree, and the white lights, and the handmade reindeer. But they didn’t.  They’ve waited until today, so that their removal can mark the end of a season.

I know it’s not technically the end of winter. But it is the end of my winter. For twenty years now, my winter has begun on December 7 and ended on March 14. Those dates frame a season of struggle, a season of sorrow, a season of surrender. On December 7, 1997, my brother, Mike, died. On March 14, 1979, he was born. So now, my winter begins and ends with him.

Sometimes death leaves us desperately yearning for what was. And sometimes death destroys what could have been.

When Mike died, he was 18 and I was 21. I didn’t know him. I barely knew myself. What I did know of him, I couldn’t understand. We were both abandoned by someone who should have loved us. That loss could have united us; instead, it divided us. Mike’s grief became anger and self-destruction. My grief became fear and perfectionism.

Today, I would recognize his broken heart in every incomprehensible decision he made. Then, I couldn’t.

It would be technically correct, perhaps, to say that Mike died of a self-inflicted wound. But he was wounded in countless ways long before the gunshot that killed him, and I believe it was those world-inflicted wounds that ended his life. They ended his life, even before he died. They robbed him of joy, and hope, and belonging. They blinded him to love.

Mike was loved.

Mike is loved.

I wonder what our relationship would look like today, with less self-absorption and greater capacity for empathy and compassion. I wish I could have loved him then the way I love him now–free of judgment, full of grace. Instead, I take all that love for Mike and I pour it into tending the wounds of the brokenhearted still here, declaring and demonstrating the unconditional love of God.

And I weep when it isn’t enough.

Today, across our nation, students are walking out of school for 17 minutes to lament the loss of what could have been and to say, Enough! They are leading us forward, calling for an end to this season of senseless suffering in our country.

I stand with them today.

I weep for the victims of gun violence.

I weep for the perpetrators, wounded themselves in ways we can’t begin to imagine.

I pray with my voice and with my vote.

I cling to the stubborn belief that this season of sorrow will come to an end.

I’m taking down the winter decorations and I’m looking for the daffodils.

My 7-year-old son, Logan, and I planted the daffodil bulbs last fall. While we dug in the dirt on that Sunday afternoon, he sang the Kyrie from worship earlier that day: Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy on us.  

Enough, Lord. Have mercy. Use our hands and our hearts. Use our voices and our votes. Use our fears, and our frustrations, and our failings. Use us—your beloved—to bring an end to this season of sorrow.

Bring hope to full bloom.