A friend was describing a difficult period he and his wife went through. I can't now articulate what the circumstances were but I do remember his concept of time. 

 

"It was six years, or maybe ten."

 

A discrepancy of four years? Give or take one thousand, four hundred and sixty days. I tried to absorb the reality that he could no longer recall a detail that at the time may have stretched like eternity. 

 

One December long ago our family was sick. Perhaps the worst collective illness in Odhner history. Ben lay across my chest for a week, such that his coughing combined with my coughing made sleep a distant illusion. I do not know how Mercy, John, Zack, and Chara fared as I had checked out of mothering for a week. Lukas had traveled to New York to celebrate Y2K and had borrowed our car which he thought had better chances of making it than his. He left his friend's car for us to use but it turns out we were unable to stand up long enough to walk to the driveway. Plus there was nowhere we could go that we would not take our germs with us. Micah bailed early and stayed at a friend's house to avert the plague and Hosanna somehow missed the bullet and was forced to bring cool glasses of water to the infirmary. It was awful.

 

Or so the story goes. 

 

I cannot summon up the particulars, certainly not the suffering. There was a fragment of a thought, as my fevered brain weighed the relief of drinking a sip of water against the enormous effort it took to lift the glass.

 

But the ordeal is gone. Like yesterday's rain.  

 

Some of the circumstances people are forced to endure defy understanding. Slavery, war, cancer are some of the names of pain. Yet I have heard whispers that even those atrocities lose their punch. I read a book called Hello From Heaven which articulated messages from loved ones who have died. It seems the only things worth saying have nothing to do with regret, revenge, or self pity.