He’s staring off into space now, and I lean forward to catch his eternal gaze. He’s talking about how she played the guitar.
Zane laughs periodically as he talks about his mom as if each memory piecing together is funnier and more joyful than the next. He’s wearing a plain red t-shirt with jeans, a typical casual outfit for him. He always told me that if it wasn’t comfortable, it wasn’t worth wearing. And if it’s fashionable and comfortable, somebody is lying to you. His jokes are authentic and genuine but laced with subtle truths that he keeps close. He smiles, although each smile ends with a moment of memory permeated with sadness and grief because after all, what’s three years? He talks about her blonde, curly hair and all their inside jokes. I was still hung up on the guitar factor.
“She could shred it up. But man, she was so shy about it,” he laughs, his thumb gracefully moving over the hard cover of the family journal. He’s studying the writing like an ancient scroll. His mother wrote almost all of it.
***
Zane Lancaster, a sophomore nursing major at Union, is a personable, loving, emotional young man. He’s always one of my closest friends. Conversations like this are nothing outside the norm, only this time he speaks in a more hushed tone, trying not to interrupt the fervent studying of students nearby. People come and go, and Zane stops every sentence to say hello or dap someone up. It comes naturally to him, and he gets warmer with each greeting. I like when we talk in public about his mom because that’s when he tells the fun stories. He tells me it’s easier to think about his mother in a fun way, with stories, because it helps him work through the harder moments.
The great part about stories is that they connect us.
But every real story has tragedy in it. Real life is nothing like the movies, where life is displayed with all the boring scenes cut out. In a subtle, emotional conversation with Zane that day in Barefoots, I connected with my friend. Because on March 29 at 11:15 a.m., his world fell apart.
***
There are moments in life when time stands still. The world around us stops, and we become aware of how finite, human and fleshly we are. It’s in these moments when we look around and within. We breathe air with new purpose and relish in old memories. When time stands still, it does so with a force so delicate it can kill without even putting up a fight. It’s in the small, earthly moments of tragedy when we acknowledge our short existence in hopes of catching a glimpse of eternity.
Zane’s mother, Holli Suzanne Lancaster, was diagnosed with stage 3c ovarian cancer on October 23, 2016.
“All I remember is being excited, believe it or not. The disease had a forty percent cure rate, and that gave my family hope. Mom was as healthy as a horse,” Zane said, smiling and shaking his head.
He pauses for minutes at a time between my questions and observations. It’s natural for him to take in the moment, devouring the tension then stepping into it with ease and grace. For Zane, the process of losing one of the most important people in his life was haunting. Yet he describes the process with raw clarity and a genuineness not many people have. He doesn’t discuss everything, but just enough for me to catch a glimpse of a woman I wish I had known.
After three months of chemotherapy and a major surgery in January, Holli suffered a stroke and was transferred to Memphis. A second stroke in March left her weak as she neared the end of her life. Zane doesn’t talk about the details of her treatment. Holli passed away on March 29, 2017.
Dealing with loss is not easy, but it is real. It’s a part of life that, sadly, some of us have to experience. Zane admits he doesn’t hope this experience on anyone.
“There’s no way to begin to understand this. I don’t fault people for that,” he said plainly. “I’m glad that most people our age don’t understand me in this way. The only way they can is by going through it, and I wouldn’t want that for anyone.”
The process of grief is complicated. There’s no specific way to speed up healing, and there’s nothing that can make the pain go away. Zane recalls his own approach honestly at the beginning of college.
“I was just angry at everything sometimes. It was all encompassing,” he said bravely, his eyes piercing into the coffee-filled air.
Zane was full of passion. Through moments of depression and anger, he sought out something that could fulfill him. A back injury left Zane immobilized for a time his freshman year, and it was in these moments when he remembers feeling hung out to dry. There is nothing that can replace a mother. There is nothing that can replace someone who so lovingly poured their life out to you with everything they had. But it’s in these moments of grief and tragedy that he looked farther, deeper and with a desperation for something that didn’t fade.
Something eternal.
“It wasn’t until recently that things changed,” said Zane, his voice unwavering. “A switch was flipped for me that hadn’t been in years. I felt like I had been stuck in survival mode, ready to punch my way through the next bad thing that happened to me, in a sort of shake-my-fist-at-the-world kind of way.”
It was then that evidence of God’s grace infiltrated his life.
“It absolutely was God. There was just this moment of grace. My heart which had been hardened for so long and my mind which had been stuck on this path for so long….suddenly it just changed.”
And the One who made him was there all along. Zane’s battle with himself was fought for a long time as he endured school, sports, loneliness and anger toward God. But at this moment, Zane’s eyes were filled with emotion. He clasped his hands together and exhaled deeply.
“All I did during that time of change was show up.”
And show up we must.
***
What appears to be the end of our world is only a sliver of the life given to us by a Creator who sovereignly places His hand under the universe and holds it with power and stability. When our world falls apart, we cling to the one thing that we know to be eternally steadfast. No matter where we are at in life, God is present.
When it came to advice, Zane didn’t have much to say. He remarked at how little he could truly offer to those who have lost someone that would help. He knew that there was nothing he himself could say that would end the pain or make everything alright. But he did know the truth of Christ’s presence.
Zane pulled out his Bible and flipped to Psalm 126. It reads:
“When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with shouts of joy;
Then they said among the nations, ‘The Lord has done great things for them’
The Lord has done great things for us, we are glad.
Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like streams in the Negeb.
Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy.
He who goes out weeping bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy.”
Psalm 126
***
When dealing with grief and loss, we turn to Jesus. We come as we are, regardless of the fragility of our being. We come broken, hardened, sad, angry. But we still come, yearning to experience the richness and fulfillment that only He provides.
“Cling to hope,” said Zane, “because I know that we who weep will go out with songs of joy.”
Zane’s mother is celebrating with Jesus now, he tells me. He also knows that each day is another day to put one step in front of the other: a chance to show up and cling to the hope in a God who walks with us if we claim to follow Him. Then, and only then, do the stories end in triumph.