A child's wisdom

     Tonight my 6 year old is snuggling our dog. He tells her "one day a long, long time from now you are gonna die. It will be ok. Don't be scared. You will be just fine. We will miss you and be sad you are gone but you will be just fine. You will see Sterling. It will be ok."

     I have a wave of emotions that hit me all at once. I am angry. So very angry my 6 year old knows death so intimately. I hate it. When I was 6 death was scary and something that happened to old people, I didn't know death. Yet I also feel a sense of pride. My child is hearing what I am telling him. He is hearing it and he is living it. Death is sad for us left behind, not for the one who dies. And the BIG one? He seems to have intimate knowledge that death separates us only temporarily and it isn't something to be scared of.

     My 6 year old is sleeping now on our dog. I am left here to think about our lives now. I get to sit and try to decide if I am going to be sad and angry that Sterling died and the boys and I are left to make sense of it all. Or am I going to look at our lives with Hope again?

     I of course am choosing Hope. Always. My boys are dealing with some big stuff. But they are better for it. Life and death go hand in hand. To learn that at a young age and to have a good understanding of it will do them well. That is not to say that the death of a loved one won't hurt them again but they will look at it from a point of knowing that its another part of life.