I have a friend whose mother is in the final stages of her
life. My friend is sad, and grieving,
and mad. Helpless. She is feeling all the things we feel when
something really crappy is happening to someone we love.
It’s especially hard because my friend has just become a
grandmother for the first time. Her
daughter’s baby is only a few weeks old, and so it’s a happy and joyful time in
a lot of ways. So she’s really
conflicted. She’s trying to balance the
joy with the sadness she’s carrying, and the impossible conundrum of wanting
all of them—her mom, her daughter, her granddaughter—to be together. Just a little longer.
But last night, my friend called me from the hospital. She sounded lighter than she’d sounded in
weeks. “How’s your Mom doing?” I asked, tentative.
“Not well,” she said.
“She’s struggling to breathe.
They tell me it will be just a matter days, now.”
“I’m so sorry,” I told her, aching for her.
“But..." Christina sounded really good. I waited.
"I just had a great conversation with her,” she
said. “I thought you’d like to hear
about it.”
I would.
Christina had been holding her mother’s hand and sitting
quietly next to her hospital bed. They’d
been quiet, together, for quite some time.
Out of the silence, her mother unexpectedly and calmly asked Christina
not to worry about a thing; it was going to be just fine.
“Oh, Mom,” my friend told her. “That’s not true. Please don't go. Not yet. I need you to teach me a whole bunch of other
things. Like, being a grandmother. I don’t know how to be a grandmother. You need to
teach me.”
Her mother thought awhile.
Then she said, “It’s easy. Just
be there, and don’t interfere.”
Christina loved that piece of advice and had called me to
marvel at its simplicity. “It’s perfect,
isn’t it? I’m going to remember that. As a grandmother for sure—but it applies to a
whole bunch of other things, too,” she said, sounding excited. “Think about it. Be
there, and don’t interfere. It
applies to our work as teachers and leaders, too.
There are tons and tons of times that we just need to be there, but not
interfere. Whether it is a process, a
conversation, a learning opportunity—sometimes our main role is to be there but
stay out of the way of the natural progression of things.”
Christina told me, emphatically, that this last piece of
advice from her mother might be the one she holds tightest. “She’s told me
so many smart things in my life—this is the one I like the best. Be
there, and don’t interfere. It’s my
new motto.”
It’s a good one.
