Thursday, June 09, 2005

Stifling the Internal Monolog

Some time back I heard 2 coworkers talking about how to talk about death to young children. And it just put the fingernails on a blackboard sound in my head. From the bits of the conversation I heard, it sounds like someone’s Grandmother had just died and her 4 year old asks. "Well Jesus rose from the dead, when will my grandmother."

Gee, a fairly young child expecting internal consistency from the world. Well that is helpful and hopeful situation. Of course, the one worker is telling the other how it is a challenge to explain that the two deaths are not the same.

At the same time I am walking away forcing my internal monolog to stay internal:

Well honey that is because the bible is just pretend and we adults tell these stories so we don’t have to come to terms with the fact that we are a random event in a universe that doesn’t care about us. And we don’t want to come to terms with our own mortality, but maybe when you grow up you will be able to do better.

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