Finding the Words

Lately, it seems I've been signing an awful lot of sympathy cards. Deaths in families (my own and those of friends), a devastating miscarriage. And death brings with it plenty of opportunities for awkwardness. The awkward in-person, "I'm sorry."

And then there's the sympathy card or letter if you're trying to communicate the appropriate expression of grief to a friend or family member who is far away or if you're simply someone who is the card-giving type. The problem starts right from the moment you select the card, as noted in the above video by Lynn Harrison. Then comes writing in it.

I likely put more pressure on myself because I write for a living. But to be honest, in most cases, I have to keep emotions out of my professional writing.

If I'm writing a story for a publication, I'm being paid for an impartial, "just the facts, ma'am" account of events. As noted before in this blog, it's part of the reason I never had an interest in being a reporter on the daily city news sort of beat - sometimes keeping emotions in check, particularly when writing about death, can be a challenge. Passion can certainly drive a story, but emotion is supposed to remain locked out. Unless you're a columnist.

These days, my day job has me writing about software. No worries there about having to pour my heart out and feeling all weird and exposed.

But acknowledging someone's grief in a way that may help them for a moment feel some sort of peace? That's hard. And maybe it's not even the purpose of sending a sympathy card or note. Write too much and you're in danger of making it all about you. I distinctly remember the intense sorrow I felt when my mother-in-law died, the feeling of being cheated of getting to know her better, etc. And now you see? Yeah, that's all about me.

Write too little and how does it come off? "So sorry. Please let me know if I can do anything." Empty. Because any of us who have lost a loved one know that those who truly will drop their lives to "do anything" will simply do it, not say, "Tell me when." But what's the happy medium?

I googled "bad sympathy cards" and got a few links to sites that essentially give you fill-in-the-blanks suggestions for what to write. It seems wrong, but maybe this is one case where what you say doesn't really matter. Damned if I know.

Why I could never be a daily reporter

I loved being a reporter. I loved the buzz of getting a story done on deadline, finding a new spin on it, getting the perfect source to give me the juicy tidbit no one else had. A lot of people asked me why I stopped doing it on a full-time basis.

Out of j-school I landed a news editor's job, followed by a reporting job on Parliament Hill. Then I moved across the country. I started freelancing for niche publications - community papers mainly, various magazines. Why not be a reporter full-time?

Well, the natural step would have been to start hunting down a job at a major daily. Better money, greater recognition. Sounds just about right. Except for one thing. In most cases, you don't start with a sweet little niche. You start with general city reporting. City Hall I could handle, I'd done the politics thing. But the guy goes crazy and shoots his entire family? It's that kind of shit I couldn't handle.

When I was 12, there were a few missing-kids' cases in Toronto. I won't forget Christine Jessop. Her body was found on New Year's Eve. My dad was a TV reporter. He got the call shortly before midnight that a body, likely hers, was found. It was confirmed the next day. I honestly don't know how my dad did it without it destroying his spirit. And reporters will continue to do it for many years to come. Not me though. I have issues with death and remaining detached when I write about it simply doesn't happen.

Some of you may already know how upset I was by the passing of a teenage boy, Edward Sun, who drowned at Alice Lake last weekend. I won't ever forget seeing his feet and swimming shorts as two people performed CPR on him. He looked so small (simply my perception, only being able to see the bottom half of him) that initially, I thought he was a younger child. I hope this picture I found of him tonight will help me erase that image.

When we left the park, I handed my son to my husband and cried. I didn't want to hold my son as I wept because I was worried I would scare him by squeezing him too tight as I bawled. I couldn't get it out of my head: he was somebody's child. Not mine, but somebody's. When I heard that he had died the following morning, I just kept thinking about his mother. How dare I claim such sorrow. How must she feel? The friends who were with him that day?

I'm certainly not saying the daily reporters who can do it are heartless - my dad continued doing it for more than a decade after Christine Jessop died, though he did move on to cover politics. He can be grumpy, but he's certainly full of heart. I am saying I can't do it. I'll write promo stuff, I'll blog, and I may write for papers and magazines again about causes that move me. But I'm simply not made of the right stuff to make a go of the mainstream dailies.