ABSTRACT
I wonder whether sympathetic friends and relatives who attend your child's funeral or come to call afterwards realize how extremely comforting their presence is. For our family, the sight of a familiar face, of someone who had flown in from afar or driven hundreds of miles to be with us was a kind of balm, a blessing. There were many of them. Just showing up at our time of need was all that was necessary to make us feel loved and cherished. At the funeral, they could spend only a few moments telling us they were sorry, the only appropriate thing they could say. The flowers, fruit, platters of food, the notes of sympathy, the long-distance telephone calls, the cablegrams from our overseas friends, all meant so much, even though we were in a kind of trance from the shock of Cathy's death all the while.
