A Felt Absence

Sasha, mine and Elaina’s Australian Labradoodle, had only been gone for a few days before the signs of her absence became clear. By gone, I do not mean deceased; she was simply out of the house. Out of the country, in fact. Indeed, our dog was on vacation in Florida.

When Elaina and I discovered we were expecting our first child back in the Fall, we swiftly determined that a vacation was in order just as soon as I finished my classes in mid-December. Rather than vacation on our own, “the lines fell pleasantly” for everyone in the family to spend Christmas together in Florida—a joyful opportunity that has become something of a Christmas tradition for Elaina’s side of the family.

As was their custom, Elaina’s parents made the pilgrimage from Ontario to Florida by car, hauling with them carefully wrapped gifts, anything that didn’t fit in our suitcases for the flight, and, for the first time since we’ve been married, Sasha as well. This alleviated the need for a dog-sitter over the holidays—a herculean task if ever there was one. It also provided our little friend, Sasha, with a vacation of her own before she too would have to navigate the addition of a little one stealing her toys and tugging on her fur.

Sasha left with Elaina’s parents by car a full week before we departed to join them by plane. It was in this week, however, that a curious phenomenon took place. Suddenly, the house grew far quieter than it ever seemed before. With Sasha gone, a hole had been temporarily punched in our home, leaving a significant void—small as it was. No Sasha meant no scratching on the door multiple times a day to be let outside and no constant haranguing during dinner time for a bite of our food (despite her bowl being filled already).

Perhaps most noticeable of all, there was no friend to rub shoulders with throughout the day when it was just Elaina or I at home alone without the company of the other. Without Sasha, there was no one with which to pass by those mundane moments in that simple, quiet way only creatures who cannot communicate in the same language find themselves doing. The toys Sasha had been last playing with remained where they were left, still and unmoved; the water in her bowl was untouched and level; her spot on the couch noticeably empty. Sasha was gone for but a few days and yet it seemed as though her fluffy presence still lingered the now eerily quiet rooms of our home—it was a most felt absence. She was surely gone, but one dimly suspected they might bump into her in the adjoining room fast asleep on the carpet just as soon as they entered. As Elaina and I jokingly remarked back and forth throughout the week, “It’s like she’s haunting the place.”

Grief is a sort of haunting, isn’t it? A gradually loosening, though never absent, grip on one’s heart by someone who has gone on before you. A faint (but ever so strong), invisible (though nigh tangible), distance (which borders on omnipresence) that floods each and every room, corridor, item, and memory touched by the loved one. A sense of imminence that somehow also seems a great ways off from where you presently stand. When you can no longer take the overwhelming presence of your loved one’s memory, it persists and stings as if they were next to you; and just when you feel up to thinking about them again in the light of some fair day, off away grief snatches them to the far reaches of distant memory. A felt absence indeed.

The confusing—and at times contradictory—concoction of thoughts that make up the grieving process can be incredibly difficult to understand. For me, the knot of grief makes most sense when it is likened to amputation. When a healthy limb, such as a leg, becomes diseased, there are times when it must be removed altogether. The infection has been stopped dead in its tracks and, because of the drastic intervention, life will now go on—oh yes, life will go on, but not as it once did. Therein lies the trouble: life must go on.

You see, normal routines and responsibilities must still be attended to; only now, such work will be done with one leg as opposed to two. You will find your way in time, to be sure, but life as you knew it will never again return to that which it was before the amputation, before the loss. And perhaps worst of all: in the deep dark of night, that phantom limb will ache and itch under strewn and crumpled bedsheets, and as you go to scratch it you discover that you were fooled once again—though the absence was felt, an absence it yet remains.

In the days leading up to and immediately following Christmas, no doubt the great joy—and heaviness—of the season is beginning to settle. I have felt it too. When the joy of a child on the way began finally to feel normal, slowly stitching itself into the regular fabric of our lives, a different weight began to take its place. The slow, steady realization began to dawn on me that, amid all the planning and smiles, this was yet another milestone in life that would exclude my father. I felt it at our wedding, and I felt it again when I became a father, and many times in between. Nearly eight years have now passed since my father went home to be with the Lord, and I still find my hand drawn at times to the phone to share good news with him, or to unburden my heart of some heaviness.

For all the loss and heartache that the holidays may threaten to conjure up, let us encourage one another with the incalculable presence of Him to whom Christmas points. Even now, because of the Incarnation of our Lord, all things are being brought nigh unto God through the Word made flesh as Jesus reigns as King of kings. And though their absence is surely felt for a season, our loved ones are with the One in whom they died and now live. In due time we will join them both. Until then, meditate on the weighty truth of Christmas: the enduring, omnipotent presence of Christ with you and I amidst even the most heavy absence—God with us!

“‘She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: ‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us).”

—Matthew 1:21-23

Merry Christmas, my friends.

---

Photo by Mary Skrynnikova, Unsplash

Would you enjoy reading more of my work? Subscribe by simply scrolling to the bottom of this page and entering your email. All future articles, essays, and short stories will be sent directly to the address provided. However, be sure to check your ‘Junk’ or ‘Spam’ folder and mark me as a trusted contact should my posts fail to appear in your email.

And if you’ve been encouraged by my writing, I’d be humbled if you shared my work with others who may also benefit from reading.