Two Deaths

Two people that I know died this week. I know it’s not unusual for people to die, but I knew these two people.

One of them was a guy in his late seventies. I don’t know what killed him, but I hope it was painful. I hope he suffered. Why? Because he was a pervert who preyed on and sexually exploited and abused young boys. Boys as young as 10 years old. How do I know? I was one of those little boys. I was one one of those kids in the neighborhood, along with several others, who got lured into his house with the promise he had “something to show us”. Girlie magazines….and then worse. Things started slowly and we were eventually pulled down into a lurid rabbit of doing filthy things. I was able to break free after two years because we moved across town, But, oh God the shame which remained. Oh my Lord the repercussions of those experiences which have remained with me throughout the rest of my life. The mortification of which I have never spoken of with anyone until recently with my wife. And now. How do I forgive, and hope he found redemption? Fact is, I cannot yet do so.

How did the justice of the Universe let him live til almost 80, yet take a beautiful young woman, a mother and wife, before her fiftieth birthday?

This was the second death to which I refer. A petite and energetic woman who was always smiling, always friendly. A lover of horses and other animals who had already suffered an unimaginable tragedy of her very own with the early death of her first husband to cancer. A mother who’s young daughter has not yet graduated from high school. An unexpected death. A sneaky taking by death. An unfair roll of the dice which the Universe is constantly throwing. Oh God, I pray for comfort for this family.

In the same week, a tragedy of the utmost grief and a death too late in the coming which provides a test for my soul’s ability to find any room in my heart for forgiveness and the seeking of my own atonement. Is life fair? God alone knows.