Chinese Blessings

A Zen story, that I first read in Momma Zen, tells of a man who is opening a store and asks for a blessing from a Buddhist monk. The monk creates a calligraphic scroll which reads "The grandfather dies. The father dies. The son dies." The store owner is horrified. But the monk explains that this is the order of things; anything else is a tragedy.

With the death of Natasha Richardson, whose mother Vanessa Redgrave is still alive, as well as all the other sad, tragic, and stressful stories that seem to be overwhelming my friends and family recently, I am reminded of this story. It's hard to feel blessed by death, but as my friend Lambeth notes, "alas, that is the way life goes."

It has occurred to me that I was fairly protected from tragedy as a child, either because my parents actively shielded me from it or because few tragedies befell our family or community. There were tragedies but I was so young for the ones that intimately touched our family. I am only now as an adult realizing, in an emotional and personal not just a theoretical way, that other people besides "grandparents" or people far away in war zones and poverty-stricken countries fall ill, are injured, or die. Children, moms, dads, siblings. I've witnessed a lot of loss in the years since I've had children, either because my circle of friends has expanded or because I am so much more affected by the stories that I hear now that I have my only children.

Mama, who grew up in NYC, watched the evening news everynight and was always aware of tragedies, of loss, hearing nightly about murders, car and other accidents, abuse, and the like. And as she spoke of it, she realized it had probably contributed to her being a serious and anxious child; even though it had not been her family, it had touched her deeply. How had only coming to this knowledge now affected me, she asked? I realize that it makes me more mindful of the moment, has probably contributed to my increased attention to spirituality and to improving my communication and relationships with people, but in a way, perhaps the most profound change has not been the creation of fear but the growing acceptance that these things happen, that it is not particularly as rare as I had thought. Does it make such tragedies less sad? No. But I'm not looking to answer "why?" I'm not as angry or confused as I might have been. Just as when George Mallory was asked "why do you climb Mount Everest" and he answered "because it is there," I don't ask why there is death and tragedy--it's just there. And not struggling against it has helped, just let the sadness flow over me, and hopefully away. Even so, in the best of all possible worlds, the monk was right: grandparents die, parents die, and only then children die.