h e y
is a lot different than
H          E          Y

unless we go around treating
L I F E
ho-humily-all-of-the-same.       .       .
‘hey, so what the lights are off.’

hey, HEY.    .    .sometimes life screams at us. HEY, stop! Look at me!  Pay attention! and no matter how much it shouts at us, no matter how much it flicks us behind the ear, thumps in the head, we don’t look, we pay it no mind and there’s the ultimate Ba-BAM across the head,  with the 2 x 4 right between the eyes: DEATH and even though we die millions of times we resurrect in even more and many ways that unfortunately, we never notice.          .          .          .

Yes, the lights were off in more than one way last Friday night early in the evening as high winds and rain swept through the Northeastern Ohio area knocking out power in a lot of places; one of them a funeral home where we were celebrating the life of a 24 year old young man who had been diagnosed with epilepsy just 10 months ago out of nowhere and now after a seizure, died.

Now, that’s a HEY kind of a moment that’ll grab you by the throat and make you breathe a little differently.

All of his friends and family were gathered together in a darkened funeral parlor, with the lights from their phones being the only light as one of several of his friends, his sister and his fiancé stood and recounted the memories that needed know background lights.

A family priest came and offered the sacred words that were meant to bring some comfort and some sense out of the dark senselessness that brought us together.  Holding his phone to bring some illumination where none seemed to be found he read,
“And for this reason we never become discouraged; even though are physical beings are gradually decaying our spiritual beings are renewed day after day; in fact, this small, temporary trouble we suffer will bring us an eternal glory much greater than any of the trouble, for we fix our attention not on the things that are seen but the things that are unseen; the things that are seen are transient; they last but for a time.  But the things that are unseen, these are the things that are eternal; they last forever.” (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)

And then came the HEY that is different than all other HEY’S; the HEY MOMENT that we often miss; that we seldom never notice or pay much attention:

THE LIGHTS CAME ON

The priest ended with the ‘Our Father’ and led everyone through the “Hail Mary” before turning it back over to me for some final thoughts and a Benediction.

“H   E    Y !”  I shouted. . .”WHAT JUST HAPPENED HERE?”  I reminded this group that we just literally became a different group.  Sad, YES.  Hurt, YES.  Disillusioned, YES! but a different group.  Here, on one of the most brutal, DARKEST moments in their lives, they had come together to celebrate a special person who had suddenly, tragically been taken from each of them and in that inky Blackness, the lights literally came on.

I reminded this group of LOVERS what I’m reminding you and others before, one of our biggest flaws in life is that we don’t always recognize what we notice and for their family member and friend I wasn’t going to let that happen for this 24 year old young man.  Some were now laughing instead of crying stating the obvious, “He said we would never hear the last of him!”  hey.  .  .HEY!

Aren’t these the questions we ask at times like this: WHY?  HOW COME?  WHAT FOR?  And then right in the middle of all those questions we also have to ask, as the lights literally came on in this darkness, WHY?  HOW COME?  WHAT FOR?  How come why what for Do we have these THE LIGHTS COME ON kind of moments where we literally see resurrections are all around us and don’t notice them.

Psssssssssssssssssssssst:  There is no deaths that last forever.  No death that hasn’t been followed by a resurrection. Go ahead step outside. I dare you to look at the green grass. I dare you to look at the flowers that are blooming and all their colors. I dare you to listen to the birds that are filling the trees as they sprout their leaves.

Maybe the lights
ARE NEVER OFF
we just don’t have eyes
O     P      E       N       E       D
wide enough
to see
to notice
to recognize.          .            .
hey,
H          E         Y