The price we pay for love

Al Mumit - The Taker of Life

Bismillah.

"The pain of grief is just as much part of life as the joy of love: it is perhaps the price we pay for love, the cost of commitment. To ignore this fact, or to pretend that it is not so, is to put on emotional blinkers which leave us unprepared for the losses that will inevitably occur in our own lives and unprepared to help others to cope with losses in theirs."
- Dr. Collin Murray Parkes 

Edda and I have been best buddies since we were 17. Just a couple of years ago she lost her mother whom she had cared for like a baby. She bathed her, fed her, dressed her up...you name it. This she did for many years right until her last day. Last night, Edda lost her father. Pak Haji Jafry was a man of few words and because of that, I cherished my conversations with him although I could only do that just about twice a year. Still, I have gathered enough evidence that he was a man blessed with karamah. Outwardly, he looked ordinary, spent his days riding a bicycle to musolla five times a day and didn't mingle unnecessarily. I shall remember him as one of those whose du'a meant a great deal to me; one who made special prayers for me three nights in a row just so that I would do well in my exams, a favor I didn't ask yet he did voluntarily. [Oh, I've just been told that he had refused to go to the hospital because he said he would die in two days' time. And he was right!]

Yesterday, young Shafiq died after saving his friend from drowning. A very obedient son he was, he never bothered to swim because his mother wouldn't let him. So yesterday at a picnic with his college mates, as usual, he just sat on the river bank, until a friend called out for help. Help he did and both came onto dry land before Shafiq slipped and fell to his death into a waterfall. 

Shafiq was everything to his mother Mak Na, a widow who sells curry puffs for a living. Whenever Mak Na sees my mother she'd say: "I'm exhausted but when I think of my son, I become really strong again. I can't wait for him to graduate and work. Our life will change for the better." This has been on her lips ever since Shafiq entered college. Yesterday, Mak Na's dreams came to an abrupt end. But we all know she should be proud that Shafiq has died a savior and possibly a martyr. In all likelihood, God has given Mak Na a much better reward than anything she might have wished from her obedient son.

Al Fatihah.

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The quote by Dr. Parkes is from his book, 'Bereavement: Studies of Grief in Adult Life'.

Pic credit: Bro. Hamid Iqbal Khan http://www.redbubble.com/people/hamidsart