Proximity Matters

This last Saturday, my Nanna (grandmother on my Dad's side) died.  She was ninety-one years old.  It has been an interesting week inside my heart.  I have already expressed much of that, and don't care to rehash.  I would like to talk about something that applies to us all.  It is a discovery.  It is hardly new, but is something that has been refreshed for me. 

Proximity matters.  It makes a difference.  I have tried long and hard to fight this idea.  In my mind, I have tried to hold onto the notion that people you love just dwell inside you, and with that logic, should be able to feel their presence at all times.  This is simply not true. 

Once someone becomes a part of your heart, a part of your being, they are forever embedded into your soul.  They become a piece of you. 

My mistake was in thinking this would make things easier.  I can carry them with me wherever I go.  It is a mistake, at least in part.  Proximity matters.  Now that I think about it, I don't know how it could be any other way.  If I could get the full joy of being near someone by simply placing them in my heart, then I would never need to see them again in order for that piece to remain full.  May it never be. 

I think of every time I ever went to go visit Daddy Jake and Nanna.  When I was with them, I was more alive, more real, more whole.  At first, when we'd leave, I was just sure that this new piece of me would carry on.  I would simply be new.  Usually, I didn't even make it all the way back to New Braunfels from Uvalde before I found myself feeling emptier, more diminished.  After a while I new that would happen, so I would simply dread leaving their presence.  They are a piece of me. 

Tonight we will be driving down late to be in Uvalde for Nanna's (her name is Doris, just thought you might like to know) funeral.  We will be staying in their empty house where so much of me was formed.  All the furniture is gone.  The house is sold actually, just not yet closed.  All that is left is the beds.  I will be saying goodbye to Nanna, and a huge chunk of myself that I will not get back in this lifetime. 

Proximity matters.  People can never leave your heart once they are their, but their lack of physical presence cannot be made up for by affection alone.  Like I said, then we would never need to be near anyone.  One time would be enough. 

No.  We are built to long to be near each other, to need each other, to make each other better.  We are meant to look each other in the eyes, and hear each other's voices, to feel the frequent and gentle touch of each other's hands upon the other's shoulder.  For being near, there is no substitute.

That has been one of my greatest comforts.  Yes, I will never be the same in this life.  A piece of me has died with my friend, my grandmother.  Yet, it is different this time in compared to the death of Daddy Jake.  You see, now they are together again.  only the thought of being near Jesus could be more comforting than the thought of two soul mates reunited in heaven, nothing to keep them apart.  They are no longer old and hurting.  Nanna's broken and bent body is now straight and whole.  She will speak clearly, even sing, and he will be able to hear and treasure every word for the rest of eternity.

Stained-Glass Window in the First United Methodist Church in Uvalde, Texas

Together again, redeemed and renewed.