How Did We Get Here?

I watched the funeral of my school friend’s son online this month, on Facebook. It took place at the same church I was first married in, and where both my daughters were christened. Her son was twenty-five years old, the same age I was when I married in that church. I watched it online, of course, due to the ongoing global pandemic.

As I write now, so filled with grief and disbelief, I can’t help but wonder how we got here.

I can only imagine the sound of our guffaws if someone had told us back in eighth grade that there would be a pandemic in thirty-three years, that I would have Crohn’s disease and be divorced and remarried, and her sweet son would die of cancer at such a young age. I can imagine our shock, perhaps even incredulous laughter, if someone told us that I would watch, from the screen of my telephone of all things, her son’s funeral procession at the church in which I was first married.

I remember having a sleepover at her home in the eighties, sitting on her bed while playing board games. I remember that she had a large bedroom all to herself, as her mother relinquished the master bedroom of their duplex apartment to her. When you grow up sharing your bedroom with your sister and your grandmother, you don’t forget a bedroom like that when you are a teenager.

I thought she was so lucky, and I’m pretty sure she felt the same about me because my parents were so young and still married. We had such fun at sleepovers, and looking back now, I want to give those two girls, playing Moolah and tape recording the latest Debbie Gibson hit from the radio, a huge hug and tell them everything will be okay. They will get through the pain life will bring them.

But it makes more sense to offer the outpouring of empathy to our adult selves. So instead, when I picture myself as that thirteen year old girl sitting cross-legged across from her friend, I try to grant myself that love and understanding in the here and now. After all, the two petite girls facing each other, one dark-haired and the other blond-haired, talking and laughing, sheltered by the not-knowing of youth, never vacated their bodies. They just grew up, and into an ever-changing world. As women, they have since learned that after you get up from being beaten down so many times, it is easy to forget who you are, and that you are worthy. Some days it is dizzying and nauseating. It’s hell. It’s not fair.

But at least today, I choose to remember us, our whole selves, the way we were and the way we are. Our youthful laughter. Our beautiful children. Friendships and joy and love. Even though, I think I will always ask myself,

How did we get here?