Gillead

I'm reading this beautiful book right now, called Gillead. It found me at a store closing sale. I'd never heard of it, but it caught my eye because of the cover and the shiny sticker that said it was a Pulitzer Prize winner. It's about an old preacher who is the father of a very young child. The preacher is dying, and the book is his letters to his son. It's a slow read. One paragraph/story per night, then let it stew. Anyone with parents and/or anyone who plans on leaving behind offspring when they die needs to read it. Here's something that caught me last night:

"... I realize there is nothing more astonishing than a human face... You feel your obligation to a child when you have seen it and held it. Any human face is a claim on you, because you can't help but understand the singularity of it, the courage and loneliness of it. But this is truest of the face of an infant."

This got me thinking about all the painful experiences my little babies are going to endure in their lives and especially about the experience (if all goes well) of outliving their parents. Growing up, I always knew my family loved me and even needed me a little. It felt good. I even had a group of friends that I knew wanted me around. That felt good too. But becoming a parent is what made me mortal. Being needed the way my young children need me is painful. Many times, it does not feel good. To know that if all goes well the very best outcome is that I will die before they will, well, even when it feels right it doesn't feel good. Hopefully I'll go when my children are at an age where they don't need me so much, but knowing how I miss my parents--like a lump way down in my gut--tells me this is not likely. And all my parents did was move 300 miles away.