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TIKKUN MAGAZINE A BIMONTHLY JEWISH CRITIQUE OF POLITICS, CULTURE & SOCIETY Nov/Dec. 2001 15TH ANNIVERSARY OFFERINGS Janice Eidus I am no stranger to grief: In the past decade, I have lost my father and sister, each after a lengthy illness. In both instances, I was able to comfort myself somewhat with the thought that at last they had been released from their years of suffering. I had been a stranger, however, to the grief that follows deaths that are abrupt and premature, sudden and shocking, that offer relief to no one. But this year, within a span of a few months, I lost two beloved friends. Both were talented artists at the peaks of their creative powers, and both were far too young to die. I had long assumed that I would grow old with these two friends by my side: he, a composer of operas, an irreverent, irreligious Catholic, witty and apolitical; she, a Jewish poet, deeply religious, a dedicated member of Peace Now. When I learned of their deaths, I felt angry, betrayed, and at moments singled out, as though only I had suffered their loss. Now, months later, my anger and sense of betrayal lessen each day, as I come to see that they will always live inside me, and that my memories of them are indeed a blessing. © Janice Eidus |
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