Our One Wild and Precious Life

During the High Holy Days, we ask the question: who will live and who will die?

Life and death are often considered to be opposites. We may think of opposites as the furthest possible points, but if two people stand opposite each other, they are face-to-face, looking into each other’s eyes.

We cannot think about life without considering our deaths, or vice versa.

On Yom Kippur we enact our own deaths. We wear white, mimicking burial shrouds. We abstain from food and water, what we need to live. We say vidui, the confessional prayer, otherwise only said right before we die. We consider the question: if I were to die today, how would I feel about the life I lived?

In our society we try to shield ourselves from death, and yet it is all around us. The summer I worked as a hospital chaplain, I was surrounded by death.

Yet only six months prior, I myself stood opposite death, staring it in the face.

That January I slipped on black ice. In an instant I was on the ground, unable to stand up.

I called out for help, yelling over and over, but no one came. With all my strength, I rolled over and hoisted myself up. My left arm hung limply, swinging freely like hanging laundry swaying in a breeze. I clutched my elbow to try to keep it in place.

I was at a mikvah, where my spouse and the rabbi they worked with were officiating a conversion. With no hands to open the door, I kicked it with my foot, a rude knocking. The rabbi opened the door. I realized it must be bad when his face dropped after seeing me.

“You’re white as a sheet,” he said.

Ze’evi drove me to the hospital. Every bump in the road felt like a knife stabbing me in my arm.

After X-rays the doctor determined that my humerus had broken in two.

“You’re lucky it was your arm,” he said. The force it takes to break the humerus would have easily cracked my skull.

I walked away with a sense that my life could have ended that day. Every recent conversation could have been my last. Was I grumpy that morning? Did I say “I love you” the last time I talked to my parents? Had I been living my life the way I wanted?

I thought of all the things I hadn’t done: the countries I never visited, the professional aspirations left unfulfilled.

As hospital chaplains, we learn to talk with patients about regrets. Have they lived the life they wanted, or is there something that feels unfulfilled?

I was astonished by their responses: most would smile and say, “No. I’ve had a wonderful life.”

A smaller number, especially younger patients, did have some regrets. But no one mentioned travels or accomplishments. They wanted more time with their family, wished they had said “I love you” more often.

In considering death, we realize what’s important in life.

I still want to travel, still want to accomplish something. But I know now that is the icing on the cake.

As hospital chaplains, we learn to help loved ones grieve after death. I will never forget the first death I experienced.

He was maybe in his late sixties. He had been ill, but his death was unexpected.

I was waiting in the hallway when his wife arrived. She was crying before she entered the room. She saw him and broke down in sobs, holding his hand and rubbing it against her cheek.

After giving her some time alone, I went in and told her who I was. She paused to look at me, blank faced, before turning back and continuing to weep. Her adult sons came in and asked for water and blankets, which I fetched, grateful for a task. When I returned, the sons had their heads on their father’s chest, openly weeping.

I didn’t know what to do. I was supposed to help them express their grief. I tried not to look at the deceased, his lifeless eyes still open, his skin a cold gray, but I could not look away.

I asked if they wanted a prayer. They said no; their priest was on the way, and he would pray. I asked if they wanted me to stay. They said yes, until their priest arrived. I stood in silence and watched them weep, a witness to their pain.

Their priest came, and I left.

Later that evening, I saw the sons again. The youngest caught my eye and said, “Thank you, for what you did for us. Thank you.” He put his hand on his heart, and walked away.

I was so focused on how I could use my knowledge to help them. I forgot what life and death are about: love. We all receive love differently. They didn’t want words or prayers. They just wanted to be witnessed in their grief.  

Jamie Anderson wrote, “Grief is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”

I witnessed several deaths that summer, each one different. Some had laughter with fond memories. Some had a sense of relief. Others were angry. Death does not always look the same, and a lot of that has to do with the life lived. The more love people had left to give, the harder it was to let go. When their love had nowhere to go, it became too much to hold: it came pouring out, painful and reluctant.

The final death of that summer was not in the hospital. It was the death of my friend. I got a phone call on Tisha B’Av, our holiday of mourning: Lea is dead. I couldn’t believe it. Just shy of her 30^th birthday, she died of complications from Covid.

Ze’evi and I drove to Boston for the funeral. The chapel was filled with tears. Like the wife in the hospital, we were crying before we passed through the door. We cried for hours: in the funeral service, when greeting other friends, while driving behind the hearse to the cemetery. We cried the hardest when we shoveled dirt into her grave. We had so much love left to give her, it felt never-ending.

She was a rabbinical student who never got to be a rabbi. There was so much she never got to do. Though I lament all she could have accomplished, I miss her for who she was. Sometimes death feels like a culmination, reaching a destination after a long journey. Sometimes death feels like a horrible betrayal, having to let go with no resolution.

Mary Oliver wrote, “Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

I have always been told I’m a bleeding heart. My heart grieves for all the people in the world who are suffering. For the people sent to concentration camps for the crime of being refugees. For the hostages suffering in captivity, not knowing if they’ll survive long enough to make it home. For the starving children in Gaza, who have no home to return to.

As I grieve these atrocities, I remember that grief is love with nowhere to go. The grief-love builds up until my heart can’t contain it. We must find somewhere to send our love, or our hearts will always be full of grief.  

When I release my grief by directing my love, one place to send it is in acts of social justice. When my spouse and I were arrested protesting for Palestinian rights, Ze’evi took my hand and said, “Lea would be proud of us. We do this in her honor. Her memory lives on through our actions.” In this way, love never dies.

Who will live, and who will die? Will it be us or a loved one? These questions are not theoretical. As we consider life and death, grief and love, I want us to ask ourselves some additional questions: in what way is love getting stuck in our hearts, and where can we direct it so it has somewhere to go? How can we use love to not only weep and grieve, but to act and create justice?

The only given is that we all will die. Hopefully after a long life, but there is no guarantee. We might slip on ice; we might fall ill. We cannot wait and put our lives on hold. We must give love whenever and wherever we can, whether through acts of social justice or by saying “I love you” at every opportunity. However we want to live our lives, we must do so now. This is our only shot. What is it we plan to do with our one wild and precious life?