A eulogy written for Lyndsey Manuel, a former volunteer at Café Aroma. You will be missed Lyndsey.
Shortly after his highly publicized conversion to Christianity, one British writer named C.S. Lewis was wed to one Joy Davidman. The tragedy of this circumstance? Ms. Davidman was at her deathbed of bone cancer as they exchanged vows. While Davidman would make a brief recovery, she would die of her cancer only four years afterward, a period not much shorter than Lewis’ life as a Christian. In a series of reflections that eventually became the volume we now know as A Grief Observed, Lewis writes this:
Can a mortal ask questions which God finds unanswerable? Quite easily, I should think. A ll nonsense questions are unanswerable. How many hours are there in a mile? Is yellow square or round? Probably half the questions we ask-half our great theological and metaphysical problems-are like that.
Such a simple phrase with such profound implications, and today we find ourselves asking questions like these. We find ourselves asking why such a beautiful soul was taken from us so horribly, why when surrounded by such a supportive community that one less of us is present here today. Perhaps we may be asking why it is so easy to submit to despair, rage, or indifference. In the same volume, Lewis gives us an answer:
Part of every misery is, so to speak, the misery's shadow or reflection: the fact that you don't merely suffer but have to keep on thinking about the fact that you suffer. I not only live each endless day in grief, but live each day thinking about living each day in grief.
The reality is that we are in the same position as Lewis, forced to live in the misery of bereavement. Each time we gather by the fireplace, scoop eggs during the breakfast buffet, or pour a cup of chamomile tea over ice we are reminded that we live in the absence of one and that she lives in the absence of us.
I stand before you today not really knowing necessarily how to react to our present calamity but knowing we must react. I find hard to comment about Lyndsey; while I worked with her each Saturday on the breakfast buffet, I find myself feeling not a small amount of guilt having not gotten to know her much beyond those moments when her cool exterior yielded to the intensely spiritual woman within.
And yet, the grief we share reminds us that as we grieve, we rejoice in the fact that we were privileged to have been graced by such a person as Lyndsey Manuel. To have known such a woman who despite her own battles sought the heart of God is truly an honor. To have lived alongside such a soul is to have shared in her joys and her sorrows.
And that is what we remember today. So, henceforth, friends, we must remember both our joys and sadnesses. To continue in the life of the community is to continue in the life of Lyndsey Manuel. Her story is our story. Her life and death are ours too. Lewis once again sums it best:
“Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process. It needs not a map but a history…”
We commit to continuing on the journey with you. We lift you to the one who answers our unanswerable questions, the one who ultimately has written our history and continues writing, the one you pursued, the one who pursued you. Godspeed, Lyndsey Manuel.
