the sound of a broken heart June 7 2025

I recognized that sound at the funeral home. Is heard it before when I was 10. It was the cry of an anguished soul. The cry of a completely shattered heart. I heard it again today at the funeral of a family friend from my childhood. The woman had lost her 36 year old son to a heart attack of all things. It's wailing really. I think of the wailing wall in Israel. I think of the unexpected was that steels your breath. I think of the intense emotions that physically hurt your body. I know that momma was not in her body right then. She was totally lost in pain and grief. There will be more stages. Grief has a lot of faces. But today was the cry of her heart from deep within, spilling into the real world that had just crumbled around her. 

There are times I can appreciate that God has given me the gift of empathy. I know it has its uses. It is also the reason I cannot be a funeral director, mortician, medical examiner or even in the medical field. To be in that room and hug her while she cried was almost unbearable. It was, in fact, the first time I've seen someone else grieve so openly. We are good about our manners here in the south. Still, we don't want to make anyone else feel uncomfortable...even in our times of need. We're considerate like that. All the funerals I've been to are quietly weeping people with tissues and decorum. As painful as it was to experience the rawness of her moment, it was also a relief to see someone just be in that moment with no regards for all the people that came. It is, after all, their event.