Winter Cold Moon
What’s the most amazing thing you ever saw with your own eyes? Question posed by the weekly calendar I mentioned a couple of days ago.
Interesting question. 30 years or so ago I was at the bedside of a dying woman. Her son was there, too. She was an irascible, even ornery person, though with a flint core of honesty.
She and her son were not particularly close and I knew her through regular visits to the senior citizen high rise in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood. Part of my work with the West Bank Ministry.
She had lapsed into the labored breathing so often preceding death.
We, the son and I, stood beside her bed, taken completely by the final drama. Finally, she raised up a bit, sighed and breathed no more.
That moment was so peaceful, intimate, and spiritual, a moment of profound and universal transition, it transformed both of us. At least for a while.
We went down to the cafeteria, drank coffee. Quietly. Bonded. I saw him a few more times, conducted a brief service for her. Then we went our separate ways.
Why choose this moment? I’m not sure, but its finality juxtaposed with its peacefulness combined to create an electric, vital moment. Maybe it was the injection of hope that my own end could be so graceful. Maybe it was the awe-ful and final intimacy of such a time.
I’m not sure it’s the most thing I’ve ever seen with my own eyes, but it’s up there, for sure.
