Ruminations

Blog dedicated primarily to randomly selected news items; comments reflecting personal perceptions

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

In Sympathetic Mourning

A popular local television news anchor, accustomed to informing the public of the news of the day, a personable, attractive and obviously empathetic figure suddenly discovers herself to be at the centre of public curiosity and sympathy at the disappearance of her husband. Her husband of many years whose absence cannot logically be explained.

She, the television news anchor is stricken with a sense of impending doom, asks for distance from the public and takes time off from her job.

Her husband, a well-known and -liked pharmacist, has long-term health problems, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and stricken as well with cancer. They, and their children, struggle to find normalcy in their lives, determined to face each day as it comes, and to dredge out of each day of sunshine and living together in love and harmony, the joy that the shadow of fear over the future has shielded them from.

In Greg Etue's mysterious absence, Carol Anne Meehan has pleaded with the public to bring forward any information anyone may have with respect to her husband's whereabouts, a possible sighting.

And she leaves a plangent message for her husband as well, to please, please return home to those who love him and are desperate for his reassuring touch, to re-establish their small family unit, telling him the children are confused and desperately miss their father.

The time has dragged miserably on without his presence. The worst that can possibly be imagined is thought of. A feeling of hopelessness, helplessness floods their consciousness during their bleak night-time hours without him. The restoration of hope resumes with daylight hours.

Family, friends and well-wishers tenderly offer comfort, but comfort eludes when the presence of a loved one is anxiously awaited and no news is forthcoming.

And then, the dreaded news, courtesy of the Ontario Provincial Police who discover this husband and father's body within his vehicle, parked on a lane in a small community in the Killaloe area, a two-hour-drive west of Ottawa.

A devastating personal tragedy turned into a news item, and countless people, aware of how profound a loss it represents, are overcome with sadness.

The family is now in mourning for the loss of their 'wonderful father'. There is a yawning, deep emotional gap that nothing can now replace with the comfort of a fulfilling and treasured family life.

The loss immeasurably profound.

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