Perspective

Nineteen years ago at this time, Daniel was a little baby who had just made his entrance into this cold, hard world less than six hours previously. With his birth, I was vindicated: I was not going to have a bunch of only girls. So many memories of Daniel. So many. And yet, in some ways, in many ways, not enough.

Fourteen years, four months and twenty-nine days is certainly too short a time to be amongst the living, mortal, populace of the world. On the other hand, how blessed we were to have him with us for fourteen years, four months and twenty-nine days.

Yesterday I was talking to a couple of people about perspective. For example, when I am typing these words, or any others, the cursor moves initially from the top of the page to the bottom of the page. Once the bottom is reached, the cursor moves along the bottom. When I reach the end of a line, it jumps to the left and I have space to write another line or two before, when I reach the end of a line again, it jumps to the left and I have space to write another line or two. And so it goes. If I arrange the page so that I am working near the top of the screen (which I like to do because there is slightly less strain on my neck because my eyes aren’t looking at the bottom constantly), then I can type along and type along and nothing happens until I get to the bottom of the visible page again.

Here’s the thing: when I am working at the bottom of the visible page, I can see all these lovely words that I’ve already written and, oh, aren’t they lovely? I love words. They can say so much or so little depending upon which ones are used. Working at the bottom, I don’t know how much space I have, although with technology it doesn’t really matter because as a new page is needed, it is provided; the words just continue and spill onto the next. However, working at the top, I cannot see all of those words. I can see all this empty space just waiting to be filled. The only drawback to this is that if I want to review what I’ve written, I must scroll up (which is a pain because the scroll function of my keyboard isn’t working properly). Still, there is this space, all this potential to fill this lovely space with more words.

Which is better? From a taking-proper-care-of-the-body-view, perhaps working at the top is better, and this may be different for people unlike myself who have allowed themselves to be talked into bifocals or progressive lenses or something similar. From any other perspective, I am not at all sure there is a better. I think it has more to do with personal preference. I like to see potential but I also like to see what has been accomplished so perhaps better is just a matter of perspective.

The same is true of anything in our lives. We can take any event and turn it into a good thing or a bad thing. The really amazing thing is that one day the same event we typically think of as good, may be bad, and vice versa. We are such fickle beings.

Take Daniel’s physical death. Why do we miss him; why do we mourn; why is this such a painful process? Well, we do miss him. From the time he was born, he was only with us for fourteen years, four months and twenty-nine days. We mourn the fact that he is no longer physically with us. We mourn for the loss of potential. We mourn because we love him. Do we mourn Daniel? Or do we mourn for ourselves? I would submit that we are inherently selfish. Yes, I know that many of us do good things and are good people. Maybe even most of us are. Most of us are not bad and we do not do outwardly horrible things. So what’s the deal? How are we selfish?

I know this won’t work for everyone because I know there are people in the world who do not believe that there is any kind of life after death; they believe that once you are dead, you are dead and that’s just it. How incredibly sad this view is. And how limiting. If I believed this, I tend to think that I wouldn’t care what I did. I mean, if there is nothing after this life, why do anything good? Why be good? Why not have worldly fun all the time? Why bother with learning, with being healthy, with serving others, with anything? We are, after all, very selfish. It would matter not at all if we hurt others along the way if there is nothing after this life so it would not matter what we do.

So, how are we selfish? For those of us who believe there is something after this life, and some of us believe that something has the possibility to be quite good, why would we not want to be there? If mortality is just a room in the eternal progression, and if all these horrible things happen here, why would we be sad for those of us who leave it? Because we are selfish. Because we do our best to convince ourselves that because we miss this person so much that he or she should still be with us in spite of the fact that this person is in a better place. You see, we are left behind. If we are still here, why then are they not?

It’s perspective. I know that Daniel will not experience physical pain; he has not for four years, five months and two days. And a couple hours. I am told that he died instantly. I hope this is true.

I know that Daniel is happy. He is with family and eternal friends who have gone on before. There may be a tinge of sadness because we are not with him but I think in the eternal scheme of things, it will just be a few minutes, maybe hours, before we join him even though from our perspective it will most likely be years or even decades.

Why do I still cry? Because I miss him. Why? Because I love him. But I do love him so why can I not just be happy that he is in a better place? Because I’m human and I have too many weaknesses to count and I wish I had been a better mother to him and what if I’m not good enough to get to where he is? You see, I still view this from my mortal perspective. Most of the time.

I guess the good thing is that it changes over time. This love will always be there. The missing will be there until there is no need for it to be. I need to be grateful that we had the amount of time in mortality that we did and look forward to the future.

Perspective.

Have a wonderful day.