Sometimes strong men cry

harbarger theory: you can never replace the ones you love. you just miss them.

We lost Pop last October. It was a dark day for all of us. He was one of the lights of our lives. Many of us have been limping along ever since.

But, we who loved Wayne Harbarger are not the only ones who grieve. Thousands grieve every day and they didn't get 86 years with their loved one. Some only get days, hours or a few short years.

But, we all hurt.

There are constants in the human condition. One of those is pain. We all have pain. Some of it is self-inflicted; some of it is inflicted by others intentionally; some of it is inflicted by others unintentionally; some is random; some is a part of life.

Missing Pop is a part of life. He lived a great life. A great life. He loved. He was loved. He did great things. He raised a family and loved a good woman. He was afflicted with cancer and it killed him.

But, I still miss him. When I eat ice cream, I miss him. When I take a walk on a nice day, I miss him. When I tell people, "Good on you!" I miss him. He'll never see me succeed again. He'll never go golfing with me again (Oh, how he loved to golf). We'll never try a new restaurant again. There are a whole host of things I'll never do with him again. That brings me pain.

But, I'm a lucky one. I was able to do those things with him. I was able to take him to doctor's visits and hospitals. I laughed with him. I talked theology with him. We shared books. I got to be his son. I'm the lucky one.

Love always takes the risk of pain. Necessarily. If there is no risk of pain, there is no real love.

It was worth it. It was worth it all.

I love you, Pop.

harbarger theory: you can never replace the ones you love. you just miss them.

This is gonna hurt!

harbarger theory: it's supposed to hurt!!

Somehow, folks have gotten it into their heads that life is supposed to be easy. They got it into their head that we aren't supposed to have any pain whatsoever, food is supposed to always be available whenever we want it, jobs aren't supposed to be hard, our partners in life are supposed to meet all of our needs and we're always supposed to get a raise.

That's a bunch of hooey! Pain is a part of life. Good food takes time and is worth waiting for. Hard work doesn't hurt us and makes us appreciate the rewards. Our partners will not and can never meet all of our needs. That's why we have friends and some of our needs just may not get met by someone else. Maybe we should earn our raises, instead of expecting them because we show up and breathe.

In short, I think we've become a bunch of whiny babies who want what we want when we want it however we want it. I say, "Grow up!" Life is SUPPOSED to be hard! Sometimes things hurt. So, toughen up and play through the pain. Scars are just tattoos with better stories!

Some preachers (electronic and otherwise) teach that God will provide the desires of your heart. That's only true when our hearts are in tune with the will of God! God's not the divine Fed-Ex guy. God is ... well, GOD and we should never forget that. So, when they teach this entitlement crock of poo, then just turn the channel and watch a sitcom. It's probably got more meaning, anyway.

We supposed to hurt, and we all feel it at various times. You're not the only one. We're all in this together. Everybody get hit by the shrapnel of life and some of us carry it around in our bodies for the rest of our lives. That's just the way it works.

So, band together. Share the pain. Bandage each other's wounds. But keep going. Play through it. Limp if you need to, but keep going.

We live in a wounded and painful world and we need to keep helping others to live through their pain. It's in the shared pain that we find REAL community and we grow up and become adult human beings. It's in the bandaging of other's wounds that we start to heal ourselves. Life is meant to be lived together.

That's where the joy is. It's in the journey ... together. All of limping down the road together. That where the joy is.

harbarger theory: it's supposed to hurt!

Pain

An interesting week.

Tuesday morning, I buried a 32 yr old single mom. She was in a single car accident and left behind a 14 year old orphan. Dad was never around. The daughter is well loved by her grandma with whom she and her mom have always lived and her aunt and uncle and their families. She's not without love ... but she doesn't have her mom's loving anymore. Extraordinarily sad!

Tuesday night, we got a call from our daughter that she had a massive infection in her leg that caused significant pain. (She's a toughie, so if it caused significant pain, it really, really hurt!). She went to the Urgent Care, had it lanced, dressed and infused with antibiotics and sent home. She's better, but still hurting. She's 600 miles away from us.

Thursday afternoon, I got a call from our son who has a friend who broke his arm badly in the middle of the night and so he went to that hospital straight from a hospital room where another friend's dad had a stroke. He went from caring for emotional pain to physical pain. He's 2,400 miles away.

The issue is that there is pain all around us, isn't there? It never stops. It never sleeps. It just keeps sharing it's infection.

But, isn't that why we have each other? Isn't that why we have the Church (caps intentional!). We can't hold our daughter when she's crying because of her leg pain. We can't hold our son when he's crying over his friend's pains. We can hold this newly orphaned girl as she cries and rants and rails over the injustice of never knowing her dad and now losing her mom. We can hold the ones close to us and hope that others are holding the ones close to our hearts, but not close to our bodies.

My friends ... step into other people's pain. It's our job. It's our duty. It's our honor. Step into it and share it. It may hurt YOU more, but it will lessen the impact on them. Do it. No whining. Do it.

Do it today.