17 year olds aren’t supposed to die

A good friend of one of my kids passed away suddenly this weekend. We’re all stunned and grieving. If it had been a car crash or an illness, maybe we could have accepted it better, albeit with no less sorrow, but it was one of those horrible freak accidents that defy description.The ripple effect has been massive. And I can’t begin to imagine how the parents of the dead boy feel, or his siblings.

When we first heard the news today I have to admit that I fervently hoped that the news–from the other side of the world–was someone’s idea of a very, very bad joke. Tragically, that wasn’t the case.

One young life was lost. A thousand hearts are bleeding.

I never thought my kids would have to cope with this sort of thing. We never did when I was growing up. Maybe I grew up in some sort of Utopia–an alternative reality where bad things didn’t happen to good people, but why then do our children have to face this now? Today? I hate it, and I feel so helpless. I just want to wrap my kids in a safe secure bubble where bad things won’t happen to them and as a parent I feel so impotent that I know I can’t stop these horrible things happening in their lives. I feel incredibly blessed that my kids still have their arms wrapped around me–both seeking and providing comfort on this horrible, horrible day.

My kids’ high school (which is closed for school holidays right now) is opening tomorrow, armed to the teeth with grief counsellors as they struggle to come to terms with why a student inexplicably passed away on an international school trip. There’s no blame. There are no fingers to be pointed.

We can only celebrate the life led by a lost boy, and from what I can tell he left much to be mirthful about in his wake. And we can celebrate that our own children are safe–for now–and try not to feel guilty about that.