Losing and Finding our Loved Ones<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By Ann Heaton<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Years ago, while on tour, I arrived at my parents\u2019 house to spend the night after a Chicago performance. I was traveling with a guitarist named Frank who was new to my world. My parents knew him a little, but not well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Frank and I arrived at the back door of the house around 1am, my dad came to let us in. Sleepy and wearing his Kelly-green bathrobe, my dad greeted Frank with a huge hug saying, \u201cHello Frank.\u201d Not known for being a hugger, he expressed a level of familiarity that surprised me. I remember thinking, \u201cmy dad is treating Frank like he\u2019s a member of the family.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n In college, I loved reading Immanuel Kant. I was taken with his idea that time and space are not objective realities, but formats through which we experience our lives. Later, in reading about general relativity, I marveled that on some level, the past, present, and future co-exist. \u201cHow could this be?\u201d I wondered. It made sense that we needed space and time to organize our experiences, but was there something to perceive beyond these frameworks?<\/p>\n\n\n\n I didn\u2019t know, but looking back, my dad\u2019s hug feels prescient. It was like a future version of my dad stepped back through time to hug Frank who would one day, unbeknownst to us, become my husband. In my father\u2019s sleepy state, he connected to something timeless, a knowing that Frank was family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many years later, my baby nephew died. As I watched my brother and sister-in-law suffer their immense grief, I wanted to be there for them. <\/em>I turned to friends for help. A lot of my same-age best friends were pregnant or trying to get pregnant. While they offered to listen, I felt uncomfortable sharing the depth of my sadness with them. Instead, I called my parents\u2019 60-70-year-old friends who\u2019d been alive long enough to have suffered many losses. They offered perspective the best they could.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I did feel a strong urge to call one person closer to my age, a woman named Kate. I didn\u2019t know Kate well. I met her when she was a college student in Indiana and when she attended some of our concerts there. Over time, we got to know each other better by chit-chatting over the merch table after shows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Walking in my neighborhood one day, cutting the corner through a church parking lot, I argued with myself:<\/p>\n\n\n\n One part said, \u201cKate will understand how horrible this is and<\/em> she won\u2019t be afraid to talk about it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another part asked, \u201cWhy would she understand?! She has a healthy and happy one-year-old daughter.\u201d \u201cAlso,\u201d I reprimanded myself, \u201cyou don\u2019t know her very well!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n By the end of my walk, I\u2019d decided to leave Kate alone, but the thought kept coming, \u201ctalk to Kate, she\u2019ll understand.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n