A story of kindness cuts through grief

‘FROM HEARTACHE TO WHOLENESS’ – the headline on the front page of Sunday Age (5/4) announced over an eye-catching photo of four people hugging in pairs. There was a black woman wearing a hijab and a younger black man, each embracing a white woman. Joy was radiating from all four faces.

The photo and words caught my attention at a period in my own life in which I’m suffering personal heartache, navigating a journey towards, I hope, wholeness.  It was uplifting to be greeted by such a jubilant photo on a Sunday morning, rather than the usual harrowing scenes that have been consuming our media. Perhaps too, it’s when we’re suffering our own personal losses and heartaches that the need for such sanguine stories is greater.

On reading the accompanying explanation of how Naima, a Somalian refugee, together with her son, Feisal, had “found refuge in Australia, thanks to a group of six Jewish friends”,  I couldn’t turn to page four quickly enough, to read the whole story. ‘ “We are family”: Jewish friends give Muslim refugees hope’ – were the words emblazoned in large print that greeted me when I turned the pages.

I’d hesitated when earlier I’d sat before a blank screen on my computer.  The whiteness stared back at me, as though waiting patiently – as if it understood my need to write this, my first story for the AJN since my beloved twin had died in December, but at the same time appreciating that I was not yet ready to write about Jennifer, or how overwhelming the profundity of her death feels to me. That’s for another day.

Before reading the entire story of Naima and Feisal and the group of Jewish friends, I suspected this would be a tale of savagery, war and devastation, contrasted against kindness, friendship and hope.