Woulda Beens

Today is Jacob’s birthday.  He would have been 28.

I always wince when I utter that phrase ‘would have been’ because it inevitably brings pain and sadness to me every time I say those words or think those thoughts.  It also conjures up a basketful of ‘woulda beens’ to sift through, like:

What would’ve he been doing today?

What kind of career would he have had?

Where would he have been living?

Would he have been married?

Who would he have been married to?

Would he have had any children? How many and what would have been their ages? What would their names have been?

The ‘woulda beens’ can go on and on if I catered to them.

But I realize that it serves no good purpose to participate in this type of exercise.  It only stirs up the grief yet again and picks at the scars. You can’t change the past.  Dandy Don Meredith, that happy go lucky Dallas Cowboys quarterback who played in the 60’s and was also Howard Cosell’s sidekick when Monday Night Football first started, coined a well known phrase. He used to like to quote during a football game that had run off the tracks, “If if and buts were candy and nuts, we’d all have a merry Christmas.” 

We can’t torture ourselves with the “if onlys” and “if I could go back and do it over again” scenarios.  There is no time traveling DeLorean that Dr. Emmett Brown has created that we can jump into and go back to change the future to our liking. We have to accept the fact that we did the best we could at the time and in the light that we were given for our loved one. To do otherwise is only to cause damage to ourselves and, in a sense, dishonor the memories of our loved one.  It is better to focus on the memories that bring the tears of joy rather than cry over ‘what could have been’.  That does not negate the pain of grief. It’s a natural desire to wish to have the lost loved one back in our lives.  But due to the imbalance that sin has wracked this world with, the loss of a loved one to a disease, to an accident, or becoming collateral damage in someone else’s poor decision making, we have to endure carrying this burden. It’s only those memories of love that can make the burden more bearable. But there is no going back.

I find it strange where I’m at in the grieving process. Now, when I begin to formulate the ‘woulda beens’ about Jacob’s life there is a wee bit of warm whimsy and sentimental thought that gets mixed in among the grief.  Here’s what I mean:

·         I can only imagine, if he would have survived and lived, that he would be enjoying life to the fullest…. because that’s the way he lived life in his first twenty-one years.

·         I don’t know what kind of job he would have held, but it would have been with a crowd of people around him … for he loved people and being with people.

·         I don’t know where he would have been living …. but I don’t think it would have been far from Karen and me … or his sister, Katie, whom he loved so much.  He didn’t like to be too far from home and family.

·         If he had been married, he would have been a loving and caring husband …. because he cared for others and wanted to see to it that they were happy.

·         If he had been married, Karen and I would have had a lot of explaining to do with his patient and loving wife … because he didn’t keep the cleanest house and he was basically useless at fixing things. But the woman he would have fallen in love with and committed himself to would have been the luckiest woman on earth … because he would have doted on her hand and foot.

·         If he had children, they would have been the most loved kids on earth (nosing out only his nephews and nieces by only a little) …. because Jacob LOVED kids!

But tragically and sadly, these are only ‘woulda beens’ because Jacob died at age 21 and he will forever be that age in our minds … except for when we share other memories of him at other stages of his short life. 

Easter 2009

And so we will have to be content with shuffling through the memories or the photographs and videos of him at different ages and stages …. remembering, reminiscing, laughing, crying, and sharing the ‘woulda beens’.

Happy ‘Woulda Been’ 28^th Birthday, Jacob.  We love you and miss you.