The subject of memories came up at the hospice group when last we met. A gentleman who lost his wife to cancer not long ago was expressing his frustration with his in-laws whom he asked to write down memories of his wife for their young boys. He wanted them to get to know her through the stories or bits of information that he was not privy to. So far he has met little success and wanted to know if any others in the group could give him some insight into this phenomena of silence that sometimes springs up in families when loved ones die. 

Most of the others in the group had similar tales to tell of relatives and friends who seem to be of the mind that their pain is so much greater than ours that they can’t possibly fulfill simply requests such as writing down memories to share with our children or even keeping in touch with us. I remember being told by friends of my late husband that his illness and then his death were “just too hard” for them to deal with and they needed to distance themselves from first him and then later from my daughter and myself. I can shrug now and wonder at the weakness of people but at the time I was outraged. 

Another thing that gets to me still is the unfairness of who gets supported when their loved one is felled by serious illness or dies and who does not. It doesn’t seem to me to have anything to do with how nice a person the lost one was or whether or not the survivors reached out. It’s more like a luck thing. That point was brought home again to me by an essay in Newsweek by Katie Couric on the tenth anniversary of her husband’s death.

Ms. Couric was widowed after just nine years of marriage and left with two daughters then two and six. At her husband’s funeral, she asked those gathered to please write something down about her husband for her to share with their girls when they were older. This way giving them a chance to know the man they would really never know firsthand. She was overwhelmed with the responses. Cards and letters filled with memories which after ten years she felt her daughters were now old enough to read.

I have a sack of condolence cards. I have read probably one or two of them. Mostly the cards contain nothing but some sickening platitude that really bears no reality to the reality and then a signature or two. I ravaged them for the cash and checks so I could pay for Will’s burial because there was no money otherwise and then I put the cards in a gift bag  and put them in a closet in the spare bedroom. When we moved, I put them in a box. I think I have seen the sack one time since then. So in going on three years now, I have done little but move those cards from one place to another. I don’t know why I keep them at all. There is nothing in them that my daughter can read to learn about her father but I supposed that knowing people cared enough to send a card might make her feel a bit better. The only problem with that theory is that if any of those people had truly cared, they wouldn’t have chosen the trite cards that they did and might have written more than just their names.

Picking a sympathy card is one of the hardest things to do. I try to keep it very simple. I stay away from anything that hints at God’s will or my knowing how the person feels. I don’t believe God wills things on us and I only know how I feel. If I don’t know the person very well, I merely sign it. If I knew the deceased or the person, I try to write something, athought or memory that lets the recipient know that I do remember. That’s really all I wanted. To know that Will’s friends remembered him, who he was and what he meant.

Katie Couric falls in the lucky widow group. Someone who got support and true sympathy.