Getting by

"Suicide" has barged into my life three times in the last month. Too much for my psyche. My good friend's brother committed suicide and my friend worried about her elderly parents' ability to cope. One of our Press writers lost her sister to suicide and our writer was next of kin and had to attend first to the funeral service and then to an appropriately meaningful memorial service weeks later. Today we learned a former colleague killed himself on Friday, after a lifetime struggling with depression and a summer with additional work stresses.

Today's news stopped me in my tracks. Our editor in chief commented that on days like this it is hard getting by. What other news will we need to cope with? For those of us without the extra burdens of depression, chronic illness, severe poverty, it might seem trivial to say, but we all can be worn down by the coping, the constant coping. And she said it's as if we need to keep our view on the long gaze, keep looking ahead, keep our visions clear to the future. Otherwise, if we look down or too closely, we may stop in our tracks for longer than we hoped. Stop and wonder about this grace of God.