Heart Bend

 I’ve been thinking of heartbreak.

Tony Campolo once said that, if you’re a Christian, your heart will break at the things that will break the heart of Jesus. I think that’s true. I think Jesus would be most broken-hearted by discrimination, prejudice, cancer, murder, pain, abuse…the list goes on and on.

What heartbreak looks like to earthlings is more acute, I believe. Lately, it has seemed a tad too acute.

My friend, Art Hains, is fighting for his life. You can’t find a better man. I hugged his wife last week and just told her how we love them. You don’t have to be blood to be family.

Today I went to my pastor’s wife’s visitation. Her daughter in law told me, “She didn’t just teach us how to live, she taught us how to die.” Betty was a force in my life, and in the lives of many. Because I am a Christian, I believe she is in a better place. As we drove home, I told my squeeze, Jim, that I don’t weep that she is gone. I weep for all she meant to me. You don’t have to be blood to be family.

Before I was seven, I’d been to more funerals than birthday parties. I know grief. But last week at school I had a conversation with my students about trauma. What some of them have endured is beyond measure.

I’m thinking of making it “heart bend” instead of break. I keep bouncing back; my kiddos at school bounce back. The bend just hurts so very much. But we still have our hearts, and are all the better for the people we love.