I cannot comprehend the pain

of parents who lose a child to violence - or indeed lose a child at all. 

I am not a parent. I have lost a child I was very, very close to but I was not her father. It is not the same and I know it is not the same thing. Even when, as happens some days, I suddenly feel overwhelmed by the loss of the Senior Cat I know it is not like a parent losing a child.

What the parents of the two young men murdered in Mexico are feeling is something I cannot begin to comprehend. The parents of their mate must also be going through the same hell. The same is true of all parents in places like Gaza and Ukraine and wherever else there is violence. Knowing your child is dead and never coming back to you must be like being told you have been given a life sentence with no chance of parole.

I have known people who have lost a child to violence. Two of them were the parents of one of the victims of the infamous "Truro" murders. The mother was, among other things, a writer. I knew her through a writing group before the appalling event in her life. The father was someone with whom I later worked. The mother disappeared out of our lives for a time. She was unable to face the group. I left too and went to live elsewhere. We didn't see one another for over a decade and then she came to a university workshop for drama students. She had written a play and they were going to perform it. I had stayed on over the break for other reasons and this woman was staying in the same hall of residence. We saw one another first in the area outside the dining room. I had been told she was coming. One of the staff from her husband's university had contacted me and told me. She was concerned at how this woman would cope.

For me it was the most natural thing in the world to hug her. We hugged long and hard. "Thank you Cat," she told me. She was struggling to be there at all. It was the first time she had been away from her husband in all that time. 

"If you need a cup of tea at any time...." I told her. I thought she would be fine during the day when there would be work going on. I knew she would not want to join the others at the student bar on campus. Would she come? I didn't know. 

She took some long walks alone, the tough walks up the mountain behind the university grounds. I saw her going. There were no knocks at the door and I hoped she was coping. Then, late one afternoon, she did knock. "No, don't put the kettle on," she told me, "Let's go out. You don't have to be in tonight do you?" 

I had work to do but I went. I am glad I went. We went to a small, cheap place which served Thai food - which she loved - and we had a simple meal. We chatted about her play and how it was going and what I was doing at the university, the plans for International Literacy Year and other things.  It all seemed unremarkable enough but it was another first for her. She had not been out to a meal in all that time.

I hugged her again just before she left for the airport and her flight home. All she said was "Thanks Cat." She went and I thought, and still think, I had no idea how hard all of that was for her. All I could do was listen. I think of her when I feel overwhelmed by loss but I know it is not the same and that it is not the same as it will be for those parents everywhere.

Later I worked with her husband. He was one of the nicest and kindest of my many colleagues. He would sometimes wander in to my office and say, "Are you free at lunch time Cat?" We would go and eat our sandwiches outside, away from the noise of the communal eating areas. Occasionally we would chat about work but sometimes we were silent. He would just smile at me as we went back to our respective offices. It was all we needed to "say" to each other. 

They are both dead now. She succumbed to cancer a year or so after I saw her. He had a heart attack. Neither was that old. Stress was almost certainly a contributing factor. They had been through what no parent should have to endure. Their marriage was strong enough to survive but that is a rare thing too.

Go and hug someone you love today - please! It's important.