Author: Stephen Reno

You can contact Steve Reno at [email protected].

Coping with loss

As our country reaches the unenviable milestone of 200,000 deaths from the pandemic, the New York Times this week printed pictures and brief profiles of some who perished. In the same issue, the paper recounted the many ways those deaths have affected survivors, especially family members of all ages. Those stories resonate deeply in all of us, for we cannot help but imagine how we would cope with such a loss. Often unreported in such accounts, however, is the impact of a family member’s death on their children or siblings. My mother died at a young age, when I was abroad and my only sibling, a sister, was 16. Through the telescope of time, and many conversations with my sister, I have gained a deeper understanding of how she coped with that loss, especially at her age and with no real support.

Recently I learned a startling statistic: In New Hampshire, 1 in 13 children will experience the death of a parent or sibling before the age of 18. Perhaps this is not news to you as you may well know of such a case or, perhaps even, have suffered such a loss.

Some have observed that contemporary American society generally tries to keep death at a distance. We treasure youthfulness, seek to extend our healthy lives, but then, when death occurs and the details are kindly and efficiently undertaken by others, we are left standing at memorial receptions struggling to find words to console the family and close friends of the deceased.

How often, in the midst of such gatherings, is there a small child, or perhaps a teen, standing apart, deep in their own grief? Adults will “get on with their lives,” we may think; theirs are many ways of coping. But what of the children?

Friends of Aine is the only organization in New Hampshire whose sole mission is to support those grieving children, teens and families who have experienced a significant death. This small nonprofit, through a network of trained volunteer facilitators, leads activities in small groups to create an opportunity for our grieving population to share their personal experiences, explore topics related to grief, learn coping strategies, and help in the all-too-human task of mourning.

Friends of Aine are seeking volunteers. Perhaps at this time, when we all are finding ways to

help others, Friends of Aine might be an option. Visit friendsofaine.com

A first step

It started in a parking lot. I noticed and greatly admired his old, possibly vintage, car, and told him so as he stood behind it, awaiting his partner outside the grocery store. What I thought would be a very brief chat actually turned out to be a much longer conversation. Of course we spoke of the pandemic and its impact on our lives and those of our family and friends, the weather, and rather quickly turned to politics. We then proceeded a little more cautiously, feeling one another out till we found we were a bit off center from one another: he for one candidate, but not sure this time, and I for the other, but hopeful.

We might have just stopped there, but each of us seemed to want to explore the other’s position a little more. We did, and it didn’t take long to recognize we held quite similar values and expectations, just different ways of imagining who could better bring that about. We reflected on previous presidents and our respective voting record and the reasons why. We both lamented the polarization in our country but didn’t deny the deep divide between others we each knew to be on one hard-held side and another equally so.

We didn’t engage in any conversational poker, each trying to outmatch the other by slamming down a factoid, latest rumor or conspiracy theory. Instead we just explored one another’s likely voting preferences. We ended up exchanging names and wishing one another well.

Of course I was late getting back home. But on the way back I made a resolution. Namely, I would find a way to have one of these conversations each day between now and the November general election. Just one a day. Of course it would be necessary to find a conversational opening that would be neither aggressive nor confrontational, and be ready to be rebuffed. But the fellow’s agreement that we Americans desperately needed to have conversations across differences kept spurring me on.

Yes, it is risky, perhaps even more so than inquiring why a fellow shopper isn’t wearing a face mask. But if we do not take the chance and reach out to see if we have any common ground with all those who bear the same citizenship as do we, what chance do we have collectively or individually?

We in New Hampshire are jokingly said to have made politics our state sport. If so, should we not get into the game? In his new book, Montana Sen. Jon Tester recounts his almost life-long effort to cross divides of class and geography, and in his political life, to understand the issues that keep us truly grounded, as he still very much is in his farm in rural Montana.

Whether it’s a parking lot or another venue, we need to take that first step.

Neither snow nor rain

If I close my eyes and concentrate, I can recall the very sound our mail slot at home would make as the letter carrier deposited our day’s delivery. My sister and I would race to be the first to gather the mail and plop it on the kitchen table. Its delivery was as much a fixture in our childhood as was the sound of the milkman’s bottles on the back step or the thud of the evening paper as it sailed across our lawn and landed on the porch.

Later, when I started collecting stamps, I learned the different classes of postage. “First Class” meant just that: it had priority. And if I had any questions about mail or postage or stamps, I could always go downtown and ask my uncle who was the postmaster. He once gave me a tour of the post office, introducing me to all the staff, including Sandy, the carrier for our route. What he and his fellow workers exemplified — and I greatly admired — was pride in their work and the integrity of the U.S. Postal Service. One of my earliest pieces of memorization was the Service’s motto: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these carriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”

Well, so much for that if the new Postmaster General’s recently implemented procedures result in major delays of the mail. What we thought we were buying with a First Class stamp just a few weeks ago may now not be the same service we have come to expect. The impact of those changes, according to postal workers themselves, is demoralizing and a challenge to their commitment to their historic mission.

The president’s oft-repeated judgment that vote by mail is rife with fraud has been disproved by so many secretaries of state — some of whom are Republicans — that it is irrational, if not virtually felonious, on that basis to tamper, albeit indirectly through a major donor political appointee, with the integrity of one of our most trusted institutions. That the Postal Service must find its way in an ever more competitive environment is obvious, but it cannot be a party to any political effort to influence a free and unencumbered election.

The late John Lewis called on us all to vote, reminding us that it is the most powerful act we can perform in a democracy. We must ensure that our other fundamental institution is able freely to play its role in that process.

Testing the NH paradox

Cellphone videos are all over the web and the media today, documenting incidents of confrontation between those wearing a face mask and those angrily refusing to do so. A Facebook posting asks: “It’s OK to wear a life jacket, bike helmet, sunscreen, earplugs, sunglasses, or a seat belt when it protects us. Why is it an outrage to be asked to wear a mask if it protects others?”

Individual liberty versus the common good?

Some will be old enough to remember the Governor’s Commission on New Hampshire in the 21st Century. Its report, titled New Hampshire: My Responsibility, took stock of what makes our state distinctive. Very simply stated, it is our sense of individual independence on the one hand and our mutual interdependence on the other. Our state motto captures only half of that reality. Yes, we want to live free, but we also know that we depend on others to do so fully. The members of that commission called this “The New Hampshire Paradox.”

Never before in our state’s history has this paradox been put to the test as it is right now in the Covid-19 pandemic, especially as alarmingly rapid spikes are occurring across the country. However much we may feel ourselves to be individuals with prerogatives and rights, we have obligations to others so that their rights and ours can be safeguarded.

Nothing more dramatically illustrates the challenge of the New Hampshire paradox than the measures we must all take now — immediately now — to contain and ultimately tame this virus. This cannot be a choice between individual liberty and social responsibility, between Republican and Democrat, between conservative and liberal. As the signs popping up all around put it, “We are in this together.”

Yes, a face mask is absolutely necessary to protect others from you and you from others. Forget partisan statements regarding mask wearing and recognize instead that we are all very human and very susceptible to this terrible disease. Keep a respectful distance and wash hands regularly. We in New Hampshire do not have to take our cues from federal officials or left or right media. We know what is needed to protect our fellow citizens and that is a certain sacrifice — hopefully temporary — of individual liberty for the common good.

Thirty years ago, the commission warned us, “As New Hampshire grows, our sense of mutual dependence must become as strong as our independence, or we will lose both.”

Virus, new and old

Just as a nation, battered by a global pandemic, prepares cautiously to reemerge from its sheltered and shuttered way of life, an older, even more deadly virus reemerges. The term “hot spots,” recently used to identify those places where outbreaks of Covid-19 were acute, now identifies those cities where protests and a painful reckoning are most acute. Fear has been replaced by outrage as our country witnesses yet another instance of brutality directed at a black man. The name of George Floyd has been added to the tragically long list of victims racism has marked for injustice.

The virus of racism has been in our national bloodstream from the very beginning, though the victims of the disease themselves have not been the carriers. Instead, the carriers have been others across our country — some with clear signs of infection such as white supremacy or outright bigotry, while others can bear the more subtle form of implicit bias.

While efforts have been made historically to fight the virus — the civil rights movement and subsequent legislation — this insidious disease persists, resistant to the most stringent efforts. As with the coronavirus, it is contagious, passed from one to another, quietly infecting until its impact is felt with life-shattering consequences.

And so we who are white shelter, each concerned that we not be blamed or harmed. In fact, however, we may be carriers ourselves of those more subtle forms of the virus: silence, inaction or disregard.

Understandable? Yes, but not excusable.

As media attention is focused on the virus that has taken its toll on a single black man, we all must face the tragic reality of its horrific impact in less headlines-grabbing ways on the daily lives of so many of our fellow Americans. Consider how brief a time it took for all of us to become knowledgeable about Covid-19 — what it is, how it is transmitted, how to deal with its deadly potential, and even how to possibly find a vaccine. What steps are needed now to address this even more pernicious evil? As before, so now it begins with clear-eyed recognition of what is happening. Not denial, no conspiracy theories, no seeking to blame others, no dodging responsibility. Awareness, resolve, care for one another as much as for ourselves, and action are our only options.

The signs posted in public places across the U.S. today that read “We are in this together” should be the rallying call for us even more urgently now. As we hope that through collective action we can overcome one virus, we must, at last, directly address this much older threat to our very society.

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