HUG Corner: Thought for the Week 11/20/17

Healing After Loss (Martha Whitmore Hickman)

“In search of my mother’s garden, I found my own.”

-Alice Walker

At a time of loss, our heritage – that succession of genes and circumstance that brought us into being – assumes even greater importance in our minds. Or maybe it’s that everything that’s important becomes more important with the intensity of feeling that loss brings on.

We may cherish anew our forebears, savoring who they were and what they have passed on to use, not only physical characteristics like eye color and body shape, but things like a gift for math, a love of gardening, or even favorite foods. Growing up, I felt an immeasurably strengthened bond with my grandmother when my mother said, “You’re like my mother. Pears were her favorite fruit, too.” The fact that I bore her name added to that bond. These things made me feel like her close companion, though she died when I was two. So we strengthen our ties of love and take comfort from the networks of history of which we and our loved ones are a part.

I rejoice in the rich fabric of family and friends which holds me safe, and grateful, at a time like this.