Coffeegirl Book Club

Chapter 8: The Way of Grief

" We always told each other…and now this huge thing was happening to me and I couldn’t tell her. Someone speaking of the pain of stopping smoking remarked: If only I could have a cigarette while I suffer! I sometimes thought I could bear the loss and grief if only I could tell her about it."

I found many of Vanauken’s observations about grief and loss to be insightful, noting many things that I expect are often experienced but unnoticed by many who are facing a similar grief. I identified closely with his thought when he writes, “How could things go on when the world had come to an end?” It is difficult to see the world carry on normally when my world has come to a halt due to a crisis or deep loss.

I remember marveling that fellow airplane passengers were able to enjoy a peaceful journey while I attempted to swallow my tears and divert my thoughts from the security of my home being left behind – the end of my world as I knew it. It is a reminder for me that there are people walking past me each day whose world has come to a proverbial end; it is far too easy for me to forget that reality.

I loved his statement of amazement that in the midst of his grief “the sky was still blue and a steak still tasted good.” As shocking as it is to see the world around us go us in the midst of tragedy, it is even more shocking to realize that our own satisfaction from pleasurable things like blue skies and steak does not wane in the face of grief.

As Vanauken set out to bear the full impact of his tragic loss, I was overwhelmed by the depths to which he was opening his heart up to re-experience the heights and depths of his life with Davy. His determination to “find the meaning of it, taste the whole of it” reminded me of his resolution at the beginning of the book to choose the “heights and depths” of life, rather than taking the safe and cautious middle way. It allowed me to reflect on the ways I live in a self-protective posture rather than opening myself up to the depths (it’s far easier to open myself up to the heights) for fear of the impact it would have on my heart. It was inspiring to see his commitment made long ago, then demonstrated in his life with Davy, now carried over into this period of deep grieving.

The other passage that I’ve been thinking about is C.S. Lewis’ writing on the loss of love:

I sometimes wonder whether bereavement is not, at the bottom, the easiest and least perilous of the ways in which men lose the happiness of youthful love. For I believe it must always be lost in some way: every merely natural love has to be crucified before it can achieve resurrection and the happy old couples have come through a difficult death and re-birth. But far more have missed the re-birth.

An interesting thought, the crucifixion of natural love in order to achieve resurrection. The idea of relationships deepening and being strengthened after enduring a crisis certainly seems true, but I had never thought of it in the way Lewis presents it.

Do you think love is lost in lifelong relationships before it can be resurrected? And what is if it is not resurrected after the crisis? Lewis’ reflection that many couples seem to have missed the re-birth of their love after its crucifixion seems accurate in many ways – perhaps this is why genuine ‘inloveness’ among older couples is so noteworthy. What does this idea of the inevitable death, and hopeful resurrection, of love mean to you? Have you experienced this in your own relationship?

There is much more to be drawn out of this chapter, and again, I turn it over to you. I always look forward to hearing the words, passages and ideas that emerge as highlights in the chapter for you, my fellow readers.