Dear Ann Landers,
"If you lived through today, you can live through to-morrow. Your burden will be easier to bear with each pass-ing day. It may be difficult to believe, but I promise you will laugh again and enjoy God's good gifts." Death and tragedy touch us all sooner or later. When it comes it reminds us of our own frailty-and it makes us all l88 BE BIGGER THAN WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU brothers and sisters. Shortly after World War II, I was the chairman of a tea for Gold Star mothers. Some women ar-rived in chauffeured limousines. Others came on foot, not able to afford bus fare. Some wore mink stoles, others, woolen jackets. Their backgrounds and daily lives couldn't have been more different, but their heartache was the same. As they sat side by side, their differences disap-peared. The tragedy each shared united them for a time at least. Never before or since have I seen more dramatic proof that trouble is the great equalizer. I believe in blind faith. I have known people who have suffered deep personal tragedies and they believe in it, too. But, I also believe in the efficacy of positive action to over-come grief. Time is a healer, but those who help time by using it wisely and well make a more rapid adjustment. Grief, in part, is self-pity turned inside out. The widow who wails "He was everything to me. How can I go on without him . . is crying for herself, not for him. Death is sometimes a merciful release from suffering and misery. The one who survives must struggle with the problem of living. The mourner who wears his grief interminably eventually isolates himself from his friends. The world may stop for a few hours (or perhaps a few days) to hold a hand or to wipe away a tear, but friends and relatives have problems of their own. Life goes on-and those who refuse to go on with it are left alone to wallow in their solitary misery. The best prescription for a broken heart is activity. And I don't mean plunging into a social whirl or running off on trips. Too many people try to escape from their heartache by hopping on planes, trains and ships. They succeed only in taking their troubles with them. The most useful kind of activity involves doing something to help others. I have told thousands of despondent people, "Enough of this BE BIGGER THAN WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU 189 breast-beating. What will it accomplish? No matter how badly off you are there is someone who is worse off-and you can help him." I advise parents who have lost a child to take a foster child, or children, into their home. The woman who has an abundance of love to give, and no child of her own to ac-cept it, can find a number of lonesome and love-starved children in hospitals. The secret of successful living is giving. There are enormous rewards and satisfactions to be reaped working with new Americans, the blind, the deaf, the crippled, the mentally retarded and the aged. Happiness is like perfume. When you spray it on others you're bound to cany a little of the scent away with you. Several months ago I visited the beautiful home of a newspaper publisher. He and his wife led me to the library to meet their only child, a cerebral palsy victim in his mid-dle twenties. The boy inherited the facial characteristics of his handsome father, but he was a semi-invalid with a severe speech impediment. It was apparent that he would always need constant care. Meeting the boy for the first time shook me. But the strength of his remarkable parents made me ashamed of my feelings. In one brief sentence the boy's father helped me to understand the philosophy that made it possible for him and his wife to accept their lot. He said, "If God saw fit to make such children, I am happy he sent one to us because we know how to love him." Parents of retarded children belong to a special society. They all pay the same dues-first shocked disbelief, then heartache, and finally the challenge of adjusting. God seems to give these parents a second pair of eyes for seeing what others cannot see. They develop a saintly patience, a nobility of spirit, and a tenderness of heart reserved for them alone. 190 BE BIGGER THAN WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU Pearl Buck, the mother of a retarded child, wrote: "I cannot say I am glad my child is retarded. That would be folly. But I can say with a full heart that my daughter's handicap has renewed my faith in human beings. Through her my life has become enriched and my heart kept warm. I meet parents of retarded children everywhere. In every crowd there is always at least one who comes forward to take my hand and whisper 'I have a retarded child, too.' We look into each others eyes with instant understanding. We know." Helen Hayes played the most challenging role of her career when her daughter Mary, a talented actress of twenty, was stricken with polio. Miss Hayes had to give strength to others at a time when she needed support and courage herself. She wrote of that experience: "I went to church every morning to pray, but I had be-come careless with my religion and had cut God out of my life. I didn't have the nerve to ask Him to make my daughter well. I prayed only for understanding. I asked Him to come into my life and let me reach Him. When Mary died, I felt that my prayers had not been answered. But I learned later this experience gave my life meaning which until then had escaped me. I became a living part of God's world of people." Most touching to me is the heroism, the courage and faith of the average people of the world. Often readers who write about a problem will add something about their per-sonal lives. I am moved by the magnificent people who write such lines as "My husband lost his sight shortly after we married, but we manage beautifully." Or "I've had two operations for cancer, but I know I'll be able to attend my son's graduation in June and I'm so thankful for that." No one knows why life must be so punishing to some of God's finest creatures. Perhaps it is true that everything BE BIGGER THAN WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU 191 has a price and we must sacrifice something precious to gain something else. The poets and philosophers say adver-sity, sorrow and pain give our lives meaning-an added dimension. Those who suffer deeply touch life at every point; they drain the cup to the dregs while others sip only the bubbles on top. Perhaps no man can touch the stars unless he has known the depths of despair. 4 SIXTEEN f Age-it's only a number, Baby! "Grow old along with me The best is yet to be- The last of life for which the first was made." Robert Browning K eaders frequently confess in letters secret anxieties i which they would never talk about. My mail shows that thousands of Americans, particularly women, are haunted by the fear of growing old. Many who write are panic-stricken at the thought of leaving their twenties behind. More are terrified at the prospect of the Big 40. When people kid about age, more often than not they are kidding from the heart. The old line, "What happens to the years a woman hacks off her age?" and the reply, "Oh, they aren't lost-she just adds 192 AGE-IT'S ONLY A NUMBER, BABYl 193 them on to the age of a

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