(In case you are just joining us: https://talkofjesus.com/grief-a-picture-of-heaven-prologue/)

In days long past I had experienced love at first sight.

The initial picture of my lover and the happy endings of our life had been one of grand ceremony; great recognition and perfection of a bride, processing down that long aisle, adored by her groom and taken away for a new life together in a new and different place; for a life we could live together, ‘happily ever after,’ as the endings of fairy tales tell.

Returning to the stuff of real life, that’s not how it had turned out.

It’s really a great mystery how two souls become joined together as one.

It seems as though those in love begin a new life, where the other becomes part of them. But if one should leave or die, a part of the other remains with them…

I thought of it on that memorable ‘day of the funeral.’

I also thought of ordinary things – daily things like shopping for groceries.

I found myself (of all places) in a little grocery store back home many years ago. We were buying some ordinary things like bread and cheese and milk, when out of nowhere I had asked the grocer (in those days, he was the owner), “Why is the extra sharp cheese, extra expensive?” (I had thought it a clever way to complain of his prices.)

He replied: “Because it costs me more. It takes more time to age than that mild cheese in your basket and the farmer at the dairy charges me more for his time. Anything else I can help you with?”

I was a little embarrassed after this. I sheepishly shook my head, no. Then he smiled and said, “No charge for my time.”

I guess it was on my mind as I sat there, as pleasant distraction away from the ceremony at hand. Besides, just yesterday I had remembered it at the supermarket when I bought extra sharp cheddar cheese for the same price as the mild. ‘I guess it’s the cost of some truck driver’s time,’ I thought, which must be the same for both.

Somehow we always seem to have a wrong picture of what things cost to others.

… To be continued