GRIEF IS A LOT LIKE THE FIRST DAY ON A PLAYGROUND

ILLUSTRATED WITH PICTURES OF ONE YEAR OLD CHRISTIAN MICHAEL JORGENSEN,  my grandson.

Today two things happened simultaneously.  In the first, the words to the chorus of the old Paul Simon song "Slip Sliding Away" popped into my head:  "Slip sliding away, slip sliding away, You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away."  You know those songs that get inside your head and won't let go.  That is how that song was.  The second thing that happened was my husband, Patrick, put together a yard toy for the grandchildren.

You're probably wondering what in the world these two things could possibly have in common - especially in a blog regarding loss and recovery.  In my case, the loss of my greatly loved son to suicide.  It came to mind that grief is a lot like a very small child's first visit to a playground.  It can be confusing, frightening, and a time of great uncertainty.  The child enters into a strange world of overwhelmingly large obstacles and challenges.  He is confused as to what others are doing and can't figure out what his place is in this strange, new environment he finds himself in.

When we lose a loved one that is exactly how we feel also.  We are lost in this strange, new place we suddenly find ourselves in.  We do not know what to do or how to handle all the emotions that come flooding in.  We feel our old lives and everything that we thought we knew about life slip sliding away. Our hearts are broken in a way that we never experienced before.  We long for understanding and answers and we want someone to give us the love, comfort, and support we need.

Our emotions swing from low to high and back to low again.  It repeats itself over and over again.  Especially the first year.  We just pray that the binds that hold us won't break and send us crashing to the ground.  Like that small child all we can do is hold on tight and hope that we will land upright and on our own two feet.  Or maybe we'll just hang there until someone comes to rescue us.

At times it feels as though we are crawling through a long, dark tunnel.  We don't know where it will come out or if we will even find the end.

The journey seems so long, so hard, and so impossible.  In the beginning we don't even want to try.  We just want to give up and be given time to feel the unbearable. Without feeling and processing, we will be lost in a chasm of despair.

There may be in our lives those that unintentionally hurt us with their words, their good intentions; but eventually we learn that we must push pass these hurtful cliches and understand that those that say them don't know they are causing more pain.  As hard as it is, we must be large of heart and accept what they say with the love they intended.

I have been guilty in the first days of rushing to judge and condemn hurtful words uttered in ignorance  even though they were kindly intended.  I came to realize that tired cliches are made because loving souls don't know what else to say.  Pain is not their intention.  Lets not purposely use our words to cause them unnecessary pain.

We may also encounter the equivalent of the playground bully.  Those that are so hurt themselves that they strike out at us.  Foolish, foolish people that sling vile words of insult and accusations to ease their own conscience.  They do it because they cannot handle their pain and, for reasons foreign to me, try to transfer their pain onto the most vulnerable.  Often they turn their backs and refuse to allow a place for us in their lives.  Then years later when they realize how they have wronged us or to soothe their own conscience, they come to ask forgiveness and for our own peaceful state of mind, we grant their pardon of sin.  We must do that or risk waddling in hate ourselves; and where there is hate there is no peace or tranquility.

Life becomes such a wild ride of highs, lows, twists, and turns.

Try as we will, there is no way to avoid that scary ride.  Just when we think that we are growing, becoming stronger, in an instant the smallest reminder will spin our lives out of control and throw us into a state of depression.  Even with all our personal triumphs,  there will be difficult times; and while we will not need to completely begin at the beginning of our journey, it takes time to regroup and begin again.  These things are normal and are to be expected.  Do not be discouraged when it happens.

If we are really lucky, there is a loved one, or perhaps more,  there to assist us when the slide into the darkness takes place.  Loving hands to help guide us and a gentle arm to hold onto.  They offer a listening ear and let us know that they are there for us whenever we need them.

There will also be those times when we find ourselves alone and having been tripped up with a rush of emotions, we are confused and can't seem to be able to get up again.

Those times can happen at the grocery store when we see our loved one's favorite food.  Or for me it was in the mall.  It was our first Christmas without Christian and as I stood before a cashmere sweater that I knew Christian would have selected for himself had he been there, I dissolved into a weeping mess right there in the store.  I could barely stand or walk.  I have never felt so powerless as I did at that moment.  I had no control over my emotions.  I questioned if I would ever be alright again.

As time passed, I began to see myself as a survivor.  I learned that within me there was an inner strength.  I realized how important hope was.  I also learned that I didn't have to make the journey alone.

There are, unfortunately, a large number of us survivors.  They have held me up when I couldn't stand alone.  Their words of love have given me comfort.  Their understanding has given me strength to carry on.  There are no words to explain what their support has meant to me.  In times of greatest need they are my inspiration.  I am so thankful my brothers and sisters in sorrow have found their way into my life.  I am blessed to know them.

I will at times, even two and a half years later, find myself back in that dark place.  Last week, for example, just for a moment I forgot my son Christian was no longer with us.  I made a statement to my other son about something Christian could do now that circumstances had changed and suddenly I was hit in the face with the realization that no, Christian would not be doing that because he isn't there any longer.   I was sick.  I cried for the rest of the day.

Life gets messy.

But that is how life is.  We find obstacles in the way of our recovery but we find a way around them.  Like a Jungle Jim on the playground we may have to go over them or under them or climb through them but with God's help, or whatever higher power you depend on, we can keep moving forward, overcoming, developing, and evolving.

This journey of recovery will never be over for us.  Our pain is like that tall, tall slide is to a very small child.  We must climb to get to the top.  How we decide to perceive it after we get to that top landing is up to us.  We can feel joyful and exhilarated that we conquered all those stairs, made it to the top, and overcoming our fears slide victoriously to the bottom; or we can live lives of desperation and guilt and be forever afraid of the slide back down into pain.  There may be those that are even afraid to attempt the climb up.  I hope there are none or very few that would place those limitations on themselves.

I say lets keep climbing that mountain of pain and arrive victorious at the top.  When those times come that we find ourselves falling, remember that each climb back up makes us stronger and wiser.

Bless you as you get stronger in your struggles to survive.

Baby Christian sends his love.

MY FATHER, I wish I knew him

Frederick James Verity with me, Maryland, 1965

We lived in the same house; we ate at the same table; we went to church together but I didn't know my father.  He was a quiet man of few words, a brilliant man, an educated man, a spiritual man, a dedicated family man, and he loved my mother with all his heart.  He was devoted to her.  She was the center of his universe.

I remember the first thing he did every evening upon returning home from work.  He would walk into the kitchen, with his engineering magazine in his back pocket, and kiss my mother on the nap of her neck as she stood before the stove cooking.  She, not he, was the voice of the family - and he liked it that way.  He was slow to anger but had the wisdom to know that his temper could get the better of him if not contained.  Usually he just let our gentle mother handle the discipline and decision making.

Sometimes we witnessed his temper.  Occasionally he took my brother and me with him to play golf.  We weren't very good being so young but he was patient with us and taught us all the fine points of the game. I remember well the day he hit his ball out of bounds and into the trees.  Three times when he tried to hit his ball out the woods and back onto the course, his ball hit a tree and ricocheted back.  My brother and I made the mistake of laughing the third time.  He yelled at us and then threw his club whirling into the air and worst of all he said a bad word.

He scared us so as soon as we got home, we told on him and you know what?  Momma didn't even get mad at him for swearing.  We were shocked.  I don't know what kind of punishment we thought he'd get but we were sure something would happen "to teach him a good lesson".

Our father usually didn't speak to me or to my siblings unless he was instructing us in one thing or another.  That sounds strange but that was his way.  I don't know if it was because he didn't want to speak to us or because he didn't know how.  I suspect it was the latter.  He was, as I said, brilliant and often times those with superior intellect have difficulty with interpersonal communication.  Their minds are so logical that issues of emotion are baffling and discussions about the mundane workings of life are to them unnecessary.

Still he made a great impact on my life.  He taught me wondrous things.  The first, and the thing that I found most frustrating at the time, was he challenged my thinking.  He made me use my mind to develop my own views on the world and the people in it.  He taught me there was beauty and power in knowledge.

He also could make me madder than any other human being on this earth.  When I learned something new and exciting at school, I would be anxious to share it with the family at dinner.  He would anger me with his questions regarding where the information came from; was it fact or was it a theory; and before accepting information that was told to me, I should check it out for myself and make a determination as to if I wanted to embrace it or not.  Hey! it's school Dad where I go to learn! The information is suppose to have already been checked out.   I cannot tell you the number of times I stormed away from the dinner table to my parents dismay.

As angry as he could make me, he did teach me to question and to seek out answers.  He showed me the value of using logic to reason through problems; and he taught me, by example of his own cold, detached logic, that there was also a place for emotion in problem solving.  Our mother taught us empathy, compassion, and how to love.  She was the one that taught us the value of communicating with one another and communing with nature.  And although my father was a deeply spiritual man, it was she that showed us how to walk and talk with God.  Together they were the perfect balance.

One of the other things my father did was teach us about the Bible.  He would read us a Bible story every night after dinner out of this beautiful old book with the most breathtaking illustrations.  He made the stories come alive.  He also showed us maps in the Bible so we would know where the stories were taking place.  It was the most wonderful of times.

Both of my parents believed in the power of education through experience.  They took us to battlefields, museums, historic buildings, national monuments, the Smithsonian, to concerts, and we learned and explored as we traveled. My sister says there was never a capital building that our mother didn't love and need to see.

As wonderful as all those things were, and as glad as I am that he helped mold me into the person I became, I am sad to report that during all those years we spent together that we never had a personal conversation.  Never had a spontaneous conversation, a casual conversation.  We never had a revealing conversation of any type.  He knew as little about me as I knew about him.

I knew nothing about his childhood, his parents, and nothing really about his brother or sisters except what his sister, Aunt Grace, told me and she told me very little.   He was born and grew up in Brooklyn, New York.  Like others in a big city, they lived in an apartment (I didn't even know what living in an apartment entailed.)  They took the subway to school (sounded really, really scary to me). They had black friends while growing up and Aunt Grace didn't even know her mother was prejudice until she was a grown woman herself.

I know how that sounds - pointing out that they had black friends - but during the days prior to the Civil Rights Act being passed in 1964, segregation was everywhere in the United States.  An ugly part of our history but it was our reality at the time.  The majority of the time it prevented interracial friendships from forming.

I never knew how much he favored and endorsed equal rights for all men until after he passed away at age 51 of a heart attack.  It was because of his belief in financially supporting black business owners that I had my first and only encounter with Martin Luther King Jr.

While traveling from Maryland to Georgia we stopped at a black gas station.  It was also the day I discovered that Dr. King had maroon-colored eyes - as he stared down at me a little annoyed.  I was blocking his way.  I was so stunned it was him, I didn't move for a minute as I stared back into those eyes.  Those hypnotic eyes.  I think my mouth might have been hanging open.  I don't know for sure but I think it was.  Picture it.  A tiny, blue-eyed girl with messy dirty-blond hair ( messy because cars weren't air conditioned, the windows were down, and air blew in at hurricane force), with her mouth hanging open blocking the doorway.  Yup! I made an impression on him alright.  Annoying little bug.

It is sad to me that even though we spent a lot of time together as a family that I never got to know my Dad.  Sad that we never got to have a real conversation.  I'm sad that he never got to know who I was.  I so wish I had had the opportunity to know him on a personal level.  I think I would have liked him not just as a dad but as a human being.


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RECOMMENDED READING TO ANYONE THAT WOULD LIKE AN UNDERSTANDING OF SEGREGATION IN THE DEEP SOUTH:

BLACK LIKE ME by John Howard Griffin

The history-making classic about crossing the color line in the segregated South.

"The Deep South of the late 1950's was another country; a land of lynchings, segregated lunch counters, whites-only rest rooms, and a color line etched in blood across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. White journalist John Howard Griffin, working for a black-owned magazine Sepia, decided to cross that line.  Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man.

What happened to John Howard Griffin---from the outside and within himself---as he made his way through the segregated Deep South is recorded in this searing work of nonfiction.  Educated and soft-spoken, John Howard Griffin changed only the color of his skin.  It was enough to make him hated... enough to nearly get him killed.  His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history is a work about race and humanity every American must read."

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Linda Verity DuBos:  This is a powerfully written book that will change everything you thought you knew about segregation in the Deep South.  It is shocking, disturbing, and enlightening.  I couldn't put it down once I started reading.  You will find yourself immersed in a world that you didn't know existed unless you lived it yourself.  Get this book, read it.  It will give you insight that you never imaged possible.

A BLESSING IN AN EMAIL: A GIFT FOR MOMMA

Lethargic, apathetic, indifferent, bored, and a little angry.  These are all words I have used to describe my recent state of mind.  It's as though I can't find anything that excites me - makes me want to get out of bed in the morning  I've exhausted myself trying to find something that will kindle a flame.  No, a flame is too big.  All I can hope for at this point is a spark.  And for that spark I would be thankful.

I have gardened; I have baked bread; I have cooked up a storm; I have painted picture after pictures; I have done some mixed-media art projects; I have tried my hand at fabric art; and I even folded dozens of origami canoes and then had to find something to do with them.  Nothing holds my interest for long. I even get mad at myself because once I start a project I feel compelled to complete it even when I don't want to (can you say obsessive-complusive disorder?).

And I have wondered if this is how I will spend the rest of my life.  Searching and never finding fulfillment.

I have been restless before but never to this extent and never for so long.  This morning, being extremely dissatisfied with how things are going (and after shamefully yelling at my dear husband and son for no valid reasons), I decided to think this through and try to determine when and why it all started.  My first thought was I'm having Summer Olympics withdrawals.  No, can't be that because it started long before the Olympics began.  As my mind drifted back, it suddenly became abundantly clear.

A little over a month ago my mother, brother, and sister-in-law came for a visit from their respective homes in Nevada.

When they arrived, Momma was sick and progressively became more and more ill.  Ill to the point that she was neither eating, drinking liquid, or getting out of bed.  We could get her to take tiny sips of liquids but that is all she would do (did I ever mention how stubborn she can be?).  I have never seen my 88 year-old mother that sick before.  Just at the point where we were ready to pack her up and take her to the hospital - over her protests - she rallied.  When they left for the trip home a few days later, she was still extremely weak and not altogether well.

The realization that our Mother could have, and some day will, leave us left all of frightened and shaken.  My mind has always known that the inevitable will someday happen but the heart says "never".  We began to question among ourselves how much longer she will be able to live alone.  Her memory is failing quickly and is much worse than it was even six months ago.  I fear the time for a serious conversation with her about what she wants is rapidly approaching.  A conversation that will be difficult because she is unaware of her decline in cognitive abilities.

All of this has made me realize that I have begun to grieve a transition in our lives that none of us want to face.  Her illness, her memory loss, and the confusion she often experiences has forced a reality upon me that I fear and that I don't want to accept.

Our Mother has always been the cornerstone of our spread-out family.  She is that bright beacon that shows us the way home.  Home being wherever she is.  In times of emotional sorrow, she has always been there with a warm hug and words of love, compassion, and wisdom.  She is my strength and my hope.  I grieve that I may be losing that part of her long before I am ready.  My heart is heavy with the thought.  For the mind to travel beyond that is too heartbreaking.

I did not know it previously but grief does not have to follow a loss.  It can precede the actual loss and comes unawares into our lives.  At times the fear of losing a loved one can be almost as debilitating as the grief we go through when the time finally comes.  Now identified, I can try to deal with my feelings and recognize them for what they truly are.

Two days ago I received an email from my sister, Debbie.  In that email she presented an idea for a gift for Mom.  She ask that we all (brother, sisters, our spouses, grandchildren, great-grandchildren) write down our memories of growing up with or getting to know Mom and our love for her.  She'll then compile all our writings into a book which will be given to Momma (and hopefully with copies to us).

How perfect I thought.  An opportunity to tell her all the things I hold in my heart and might have never told her except for this.  Initially, because of my lethargic, apathetic, indifferent, and ready-to-give-up-before-I-begin attitude, I was a little overwhelmed with the thought of such a large endeavor but now I feel invigorated.

I can take all those sad feelings, turn them inside out, and do something good and positive.  Already I feel better.  Or I will.  As soon as I get my own time-warped mind in gear.  What a blessing my sister's email has been to me.

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SAMPLES OF ARTWORK FROM THE MIND OF AN OBSESSIVE-COMPLUSIVE MAD WOMAN LIVING ON THE EDGE:



WATERCOLORS:

FABRIC ART:  I just discovered this art medium.  Everything is made with small pieces of cloth. These are my first attempts.

I received a photograph of my grandson, Benton, walking in the rain.  I just love it and tried to duplicate it in fabric.

MIXED MEDIA ART:  The base images were taken from the website of Cloth, Paper, Scissors.  I just added the embellishments.  I thought it would be fun to show a mermaid under water with an umbrella.

I made the panels for the umbrella with alcohol ink; I braided strands and strands and strands of thread to make the braided hair; I added the shell and starfish.

I made and added the star fish, stitched in the highlights for the hair, and made and added the bands around her hair and around her neck.

ORIGAMI CANOES:  Whatcha goin'a do with a dozen handmade and painted canoes?  Paint a beach picture and add them on.

SELF-DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR

During our lifetimes we will all lose someone we love and will have to deal with coming to terms with the death of our loved one.  As we know that journey can be long and difficult especially when dealing with a loss by suicide.  There are so many questions without answers and the range of emotions the bereaved experiences is not only arduous but confusing.

Today I happened upon an article that ask the question, "What is reasonable grief?" I didn't read any further because the nature of the question suggests that perhaps grief could be "unreasonable".  The very definition of "unreasonable" means: not governed by reason; irrational or absurd.  Exceeding reasonable limits.  For me, grief and unreasonable didn't belong in the same sentence.  After I retracted my claws, I gave some thought to the question and decided that perhaps there might just be some sound thinking there and the question could have merit.

There is one aspect of grieving that no one really wants to talk about or acknowledge.  Self-destructive behavior.  I, for one, thinking of myself as a strong woman hates to admit that I have great failings and overpowering weaknesses.

When I lost my son, I lost part of myself with him.  I not only loved Christian, I was incredibly proud of him.  An emotion shared by most parents.  I was proud of the man he had become.  I was proud of his accomplishments and I was proud of the fact that there was no job too small that he wasn't willing to do to help himself and others succeed.  I was blown away with the fact that he had earned his first million before he was twenty-five years old.  He not only loved life, he celebrated it; and he loved people.  He would go out of his way to help a friend in need.  He had the most amazing sense of humor ... he could make us laugh until our sides ached and tears ran down our cheeks.  He was intelligent and passionate about those things he believed in.  And for me, most importantly he loved me with all his heart.

His passing left more than a hole in my heart.  It left a huge, huge hole in my very soul.  I could not begin to image life without him in it.  The thing that hurt me the very most and the thing that I still cannot come to terms with is the hurt and the pain and disappointment he felt for the last two years of his life.  He was disappointed in himself and felt that he personally had failed in life.  It was this unbearable pain in his obsessive compulsive need for perfection that caused him to end his life.   We, as parents, live our children's pain and I, as his mother, could not fix that pain.  I could not change it and I cannot fix the hurt within myself that I felt for him.  This hurt and pain is so monstrous, so all encompassing that it consumes me.  It is something that I have no control  over.  I am buried beneath its weight.  This, I suppose, could be consisted "unreasonable" grief .... a nicer way of saying it would be to call it "complicated grief".

Several years ago I read an article in a magazine where Paula Deen had stated that when she was severely depressed that she would go to a casino and play the slots for hours as a way of escape.  I must have stuck that comment somewhere in my memory banks because I remembered it about eight months after we lost Christian.  I was, indeed, so, so depressed and working overtime to not let anyone know.  I wanted desperately for my family and friends to think that I was okay and that I was working through my grief.  Let me tell you, I was not okay then and I'm still not okay.  Denial of emotion takes a serious toll not only on the mind but on the body.   I have all this hurt inside me and I don't know what to do with it.

So I decided to give Paula Deen's way of coping a chance and you know what, it worked.  Temporarily. I could just sit there and watch a bunch of symbols fall down into place without any thought at all and sometimes there was even a monetary reward that came with it.  But the winning of money was not the object, getting lost in the moment was.  Unfortunately, money does become the issue; or rather the losing of money to be more precise.

That escape from emotion becomes addictive - as addictive as any drink or drug.  Before I even realized it, this self-destructive behavior had become MY coping mechanism.  Cannot deal with life?  Go to the casino and forget for a while.  The darkness, the cool air,  the sounds, the personal solitude are soothing.

All that is okay, I guess, if you can afford to go gamble (goodness, how I hate that word) like Paula Deen can but I can't.  So a cycle began.  I get my check,  I go to the casino only intending to spend forty dollars but once there, I can't stop because there is not enough time in the world for the pain to end.  It is endless but for just a while I don't think about it.  I don't want to leave because I know I know what is waiting for me outside those doors.   Next thing I know I'm driving home hating myself for being so weak and for not stopping when I knew I should.  I don't have enough money to pay my bills and now I'm suicidal.  Only fear of the pain I would cause my husband and children prevent that from happening.  In my unsound mind I wonder if the day will come when even that is not enough.


I know what you're thinking - just don't go to the casino in the first place.  That would seem the likely answer.  I'm intelligent.  I know that in the same way an alcoholic or a drug addict knows that what they are doing is wrong.  All of us know that help is available - but that's for the other guy.  To ask for help means help is needed.


There are two reasons that I decided to write about this.  One is entirely selfish.  I am hoping by admitting my own weakness , my own self-destructive behavior  - and you'll never know how hard that is to do - that I will find the strength to do something about it.


The second reason is because I want to open the dialogue on a subject that is very often swept under the rug.  A subject that is seldom, if ever,  talked about.  I want other wounded souls to know that they are not alone.  I want them to know that we can, if we're willing,  reach out and help others if only by admitting we are out of rhythm with life and have a problem.  There is strength in that.


What I have been doing to cope isn't working; but it is only one example of self-destructive behavior that survivors can find themselves becoming involved in.  I know that I am not alone in trying to find an escape from pain and I know that it's a hard subject to talk about.  I give praise to those that are strong enough to avoid the pitfalls of hurtful behavior - and there are many; but there are, I fear, many more like myself that find themselves in a bad place in their lives and are doing things that they never thought possible and facing weakness within themselves that they didn't know were there.  Grief can do that to people.


Self-destructive behavior comes in many forms.  Some seemingly innocent.  It can be anything that prevents us from a healthy involvement in life and puts our quality of life in jeopardy.  At least that is my definition.  Medical professions probably have a different definition altogether but for the sake of pleasing me, lets go with my definition for now.  If we're neglecting our family and living an artificial life then I suppose spending far too much time on websites like Facebook might fall into that category as well.   Escape can be found there too but each of us will have to make that determination for ourselves as to how much is too much.

Seeking escape and relief from pain can be done in positive ways.  We need to study our talents and resources to find avenues of self-fulfillment.  We need to find a vehicle or container for our emotions but we must take care that that container does not have the words "Self-Destruction" written on the side.

It isn't going to be easy but I must learn to deliberately reconstruct my life WITHOUT the negative behavior that is destroying my quality of life - before it ends my life.


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I don't want to end on a negative thought so I'm attaching a picture of an art quilt that if I quilted, which I don't, I would love to make.  The designer is McKenna Ryan of Pine Needle Designs.  She is an amazing artist and quilter.  She can be found at:   http://www.pineneedles.com/

SHAKEN OUT AND EMPTY

The time has arrived in this journey of survival where words seem inadequate to clearly and accurately describe what it means or how it feels to lose someone you love dearly.  I have in my lifetime lost many loved ones.  Death has come in many forms - natural deaths, a murder, the untimely and devastating passing of a precious five year old little girl that lived next door;  miscarriages; but nothing, nothing , nothing compares with the loss of not one child but two.

Christian, the sunshine and joy of our family, died by suicide on January 18, 2010.  Heather, although not my biological child, was my daughter by her choosing and mine - and who I could not have loved more - died a needless death on June 19, 2012.  Both were 32 years old at the time of their passing.

Both could have been saved if only the universe had opened the gates to the heavens and revealed to me the mysteries and the wisdom found there.  The answers certainly were not to be found within myself.  If love had been enough, I wouldn't be sitting here tonight writing these words and feeling this pain.

In the past words have been my friend.  They flowed as freely as did the tears that streamed down my cheeks......but no more.  Words fail me.  I feel so empty.  I feel as though someone has opened the top of my head, turned me upside down, and shaken all the emotion out.

Having experience it before, I recognize what is happening.  It is the same numbness I felt when I lost Christian.  I know, too, there are no words that can fix it.  It must be struggled through with all it's varying emotions ...... and questions that have no answers.

There is the inevitable guilt ... could I have done anything to make a difference in my sweet girl's life?  I KNOW guilt is a worthless emotion but I have felt it nonetheless.  I have questioned my worthiness to be called her "momma".  She never told me about the pain she was in.  All our conversations were loving and sweet but looking back on it now and knowing what I have learned, they were not honest conversations.  I know that she loved me in the purist and sweetest way and wanted to protect me from additional pain but still I say to myself "I should have known something was wrong.  I should have felt it."  How many other survivors have questioned themselves in the same way?

I learned a lot of valuable and hard lessons when my Christian left us.  I learned that life is a journey and in that journey there are many special moments but there are also times of hardship and heartache.  I learned that regardless of which experience you are dealing with if we put aside anger, guilt, and blame we grow and progress even when we are not aware of it.  I also learned that without love in our hearts and a willingness to reach out, help, and support others that our own healing slows to a crawl.

I learned that more love is received than given when we allow others into our lives that have lived through (to a degree) what we are now going through.  The amount of love and caring that is showered upon us by our fellow survivors is both humbling and our source of greatest earthly strength.

Even with all I have learned in the last two years and six months, I know this one last thing.  Knowledge is not enough.  Experience is not enough.  With the loss of each loved one, the pain and the journey begins anew.

ANOTHER SEASON OF MOURNING BEGINS

Looking back on it now, the weather seemed oddly appropriate.  The first day was sunny and bright and warm.  Not warm by some standards but warm for those of us use to cooler temperatures.  On the second visit,  it rained and although it had stopped in the afternoon, it remained gray and overcast and dismal.  In Western Washington we are use to such days but on this day it was not just the dampness of the day, the mood of the city seemed to have changed.  Or perhaps that change was only reflected in those of us that loved her.

The first day I visited there was still hope.  The chances of recovery were slim but when you have nothing else, you grab on to "hope" with both hands and hold on tight.

When my youngest daughter, Tiffany, called me and told me that Heather, her best friend from childhood, was in the hospital gravely ill, I automatically assumed it was a crisis that would be overcome and soon she would recover and get out of the hospital.  She was only 32 after all.  Young and strong.

Tiffany was not so optimistic.  She tried to prepare me for what I would see.  She told me that Heather's liver was in the end stages of liver disease.  She said that her kidneys had stopped functioning and she was on a dialyze machine.  She warned that she was bright yellow, swollen, and because fluid was accumulating throughout her body, it was also flooding her brain and she wasn't always lucid.

Her roommates had waited three days after she turned bright yellow and was in extreme pain before calling 911.  A decision that might have cost Heather her life.  By the time she got to the hospital, her situation was already beyond critical.

Heather was as much a member of our family as each of us were.  Growing up she seem to be at our house more than she was at her own.  Sometimes she would be there for weeks without going home.  The kids thought of her as a sibling and I loved her as though she was my own.

Our family was as different from hers as night is to day.  Two families could not have been more different.  Her family was distant and aloof.  Showing emotion was consisted a sign of weakness and although there was a lot of love, there was little outward affection.  Heather craved affection.

Our family, in contrast, is a huggie, touchy, verbal, love you forever, demonstrative bunch.  We adored Heather and she blossomed in our loving environment.  No one sparkled like Heather.  She was funny, witty, and full of life.

Son, Bobby, and I drove from the Olympic Peninsula to pick up daughter Stephanie in Auburn and then on into Seattle to pick up Tiffany so we could all go to the hospital together (thank goodness Tiffany was with us - Harborview Crisis Center is a maze of different facilities).   As soon as daughter Robyn in Arizona learned about Heather she immediately booked a flight home.  We would all be there for her as a family.  Her family.

Even though Tiffany had attempted to explain Heather's condition, nothing could prepare us for what we saw.  When we got to the Critical Care Unit, we had to sanitize our hands and then put on gloves and a gown before we could enter her room.  That was to protect both her and us.

I knew she would be jaundiced but I didn't know that she would be the color of a school bus.  The only thing white was her teeth which appeared bright white in comparison.  Her eyes seem to be floating in a pool of yellow fluid.  Her legs were purple and splotching and were about twenty times their normal size and were beginning to split.  Her abdomen was swollen and bloated.

All that  was hard to see but I could handle it.  What I was not prepared for was the agonizing pain and  suffering she was going though.  Because her blood pressure was so low, they couldn't give her any sedation for fear of her blood pressure  bottoming out.  Her body was so swollen that it was leaching the toxic fluids in her body out through her skin.  Because her liver and kidneys weren't functioning, she was septic.  They didn't want any of her body fluids to get on us because of the degree of toxicity.

While we were there they had to perform several painful procedures without pain medication.  It was all too horrible for words but she handled it with dignity and grace.   We were made to leave the room but Heather needed for Tiffany to be within ear shot.  Tiffany's voice soothed her and gave her strength.  I was amazed at how well Tiffany responded to her friend's needs.  She seem to know just the right things to say and do.

She was so pleased and surprised that we all came to see her.  "You're here to see me?"  There was no place else we would be except by her side.  It was sad that she didn't realize that.  She was and always will be our girl.

Even though she was in so much pain, she still managed to joke around and make us laugh.  We made plans to go camping at the lake.  We agreed that when she got out the hospital that she'd come stay with me so I could take care of her and nurse her back to health.

At one point she squeezed my hand and said "Momma, I'm so sick.  Am I going to get better?" I hesitate just a quick second  and then said "Of course you are Baby.  You just have to stay here until you're better."  She said "Pinky swear?" and extended her little pinky.  I linked my pinky with hers and it was all I could do to not break down in front of her.  It was at that moment that I realized this was the only promise I had ever made to her that I wasn't sure I could keep.  Bobby and Stephanie left the room so she wouldn't see their tears.

This was the last day our Heather was conscious.  That evening she went into a coma that she never awoke from.  She was placed on life support.  We were not made aware of this until Tiffany went to the hospital the following day.

After I got home that night, I was unable to sleep.  I alternated between body racking sobs and staring off into space.  Finally around 4 a.m. while it was still black outside, I went outside in only my nightgown to sit on the front porch - thankful for the cold, frigid air.  I was so empty inside that I wanted to feel something - anything.

While I was sitting there in the icy darkness just staring off into the trees that I knew were there but couldn't see, one side of the trees suddenly lit up as though someone had turned a bright light on inside each of them.  From the illumination I could see that a ground fog was rolling in.  It was such an unusual phenomenon that my first instinct was to run and get my camera; but something greater than myself, told me to quiet myself and remain where I was. It lasted only three to four minutes at the most but during that time I came to realize with a certainty that whatever was going to happen in the following days would be okay.

Soon after the birds began their songs.

Tiffany sat by her bedside day after day waiting for her best friend to open her eyes.  The nurses said they were baffled and didn't understand why she wasn't waking up.

Robyn arrived from Arizona.  Again we gathered the family, including daughter-in-law,  Rhiannon, and drove to the hospital on that gloomy, cold day.  We got to see her that one last time, hold her warm hand and tell her we loved her.

We learned from the doctor that her brain had been "showered with strokes" and the ventilator was the only thing keeping her alive.  Later that evening her parents would arrive and the doctor would advise they remove her from life-support and let her go.  A decision no parent should ever have to make.  It took them two days to finally gather the strength to let her slip away.  But in our heart of hearts we knew she was already gone - had left us during the night of that first day.

And thus another season of mourning began.  I longed for a thunderous rainstorm.  I wanted something strong and torrential to wash these feelings away.  The emptiness in our hearts and in our lives was so heavy  I could barely breathe.  The pain so unbearable that I wanted to fade away into nothingness so I'd never have to feel this depth of grief and sorrow again.

Initially I thought this type of grief was very different from what I felt when Christian took his life.  He was in such emotional pain.  He felt there was no hope, no future, nothing that could save him from the depression and despair.

Heather's drinking might have started from a desire to have fun but as her life unfolded it began to take on that same depression and emotional pain that Christian felt.  Heather struggled with self worth issues her entire life.  Issues only made worse by bad, destruction relationships.  She used alcohol to ease the pain.  I do not think that she ever thought that it would eventually take her life.

Regardless of the form their deaths took, they are both gone at the tender age of 32 and leave in their wake huge voids in our lives.  Where there was once sparkle and glitter, there is nothing.

THERE WERE TWO BOXES AND BOTH HELD MY HEART

"The human heart has hidden treasure, In secret kept, in silence sealed;  The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures, Whose charms were broken if revealed" .....   Charlotte Bronte


Long neglected it sits there like a sentry.  The top covered in a thick layer of dust.  A box.... black,  cold, and heavy.  So heavy.  Made of granite.  On the face printed in gold is a lighthouse.  A lighthouse to show lost souls a safe way home.  A beacon in the dark.  The box is  forever sealed.  It will never be opened.  Its contents never viewed.

Why she would neglect it, not even she knew.  Perhaps it was because it was too hard for her to accept what it was, what it held.  Is that why she placed her son's picture in front of it?  so she wouldn't have to see it.  But yet she still wants it close.  Needs to know that it is there.  Inside she can faintly hear her  own beating heart.

On that day when so many decisions had to be made, this is the one that the most thought went into.  Nothing would ever be perfect enough but this seemed the closest.  The lines were simple and elegant.  Minimalistic.  Made of natural stone.  He would like that.

His eyes would have skimmed past the ornate floral urns and she felt certain they would have come to rest on the one she selected for him.  She smiled knowing that he would have preferred the silhouette of an elegantly dressed gentleman to the gold lighthouse.  Black on black.  Even if there had been time, she, of course, would never have found such an urn.  Funeral homes are more into symbolism.  So having no other choice, she had to take the lighthouse.

There were two boxes actually.  The cold, black one that sets on the buffet in a place of honor; and the slightly smaller, black box she carries with her in her heart.  That box has a lock and a key although she doubts the key will ever be used.  Mentally she has pushed the box to the far back corner of her heart.  Sometimes she will go there in the dreamtime.  She isn't always asleep when she dreams.  It sits in a dark, cool corner hidden from all the other things she has placed inside her heart.  This is her secret place.

She pushes aside the sheer curtains and settles herself down next to this object of light and dark mysteries.  She lets her hand rest on the cold lid.  Inside are all her memories - good and bad.  Tales of joy, tales of shame, tales of adventures, tales of all that is good in her life and all that is bad; and inside this box lies tales of death.  The memories are all hers.  She has lived each one.  She doesn't have to use the key.  She knows what is there.  For this is a box that she crafted herself.

Without opening the lid she pulls from the box her memory, at age five, of her father, a soldier.  She barely remembered him even then.  She had brief memories of him laughing and playing with her; and in one he was yelling - loudly.  She remembered being so frightened that she hid under the blankets on the bed upstairs.  Then he went away, she didn't know why, but she never saw him again.  It was okay because she still had her mother and that really was all she needed.

One day she came into the bedroom and she saw her mother crying.  Crying as though her heart had broken.  "Why are you crying Mother?"  She lifted me onto her lap and brushed my hair away from my face.  "Your father has died."  I was only five and didn't need to know more than that.  I was sad because she was sad.

One of my happy memories during that time was sitting on the bed with my mother and two brothers and listening to the radio.  Someone named Elizabeth was being crowned queen.  I didn't understand all of it but I knew it had to a wonderful thing because all the people were cheering and Momma was smiling.  Momma explained that what was happening on the radio was taking place in a far away land.  She said this was a very important day that we should never forget.  And I didn't.

I look deeper inside the box and memories of years far distant  fly by like the rushing wind.  There I am growing up, my Mom remarries, life is good.  A little sister and brother are born.  There's lots of laughter both at home and at school.  My step dad adopts my brother and me.  I graduate from high school.  I travel to Europe that summer and in the fall I travel across the U.S.  and back again.  I get a job working for the FBI while waiting to go to college.

I move away from home and at age 20 I get married.  Life is not good.  My husband is not the kind, loving man I thought he was when we married.  He is cruel.  In spite of all the ugliness, a beautiful, precious little daughter is born.  He adores her.  He goes away to Viet Nam for a year.  While he is gone, our first son is born.  When he returns, he begins drinking heavily.  He becomes an abusive alcoholic.  We have two more children, Christian and Tiffany. During those years our children are the source of my joy and happiness.  They are the lights of my life.

Looking further, I see myself sitting at the phone dialing a number.  It is Thanksgiving and I am calling home to wish my Mom and Dad a Happy Thanksgiving.  My sister-in-law answers the phone.  When she hears my voice, she says nothing but quickly gets my Mother of the phone.  How strange I think to myself.  My Mother's sad voice tells me that my father has died that afternoon of a heart attack.  I am heartbroken.   I didn't know anything could hurt that much.

More years speed pass.  I divorce.  My Mother remarries.  She marries a wonderful, funny, loving man.  The children call him "Grandpa Jack".  Everyone loves him.

More years pass and then one day I receive a telephone call from my Mother.  Her voice is strained. There has been a car accident she says.  Grandpa Jack is gone and so is his brother Don.  Black, black days.  So hard when you never get to say good-bye.  Now she has loss three husbands.

Time passes and I remarry.  His name is Patrick.  He is a good, good man.  He makes me laugh and shows me a life I never expected to call my own.  My Mother also remarries.  His name is Bob.  Bob Artz.  They move to Henderson, Nevada.  Bob is a true gentleman.  He and Momma are very happy and spend many wonderful years together.  But then he, too, dies and my Mother is alone once again.  I do not know how she endures such pain.  She cries a lot and often.  I know she will never be the same.  She has lost the love of her life.  She cries out to God, "Why do You take all the men I love?"

I thought Death was done with me.   Done with our family.  The idea of my Mother passing on is pushed as far from my mind as I can possibly get it.  But, no, Death is not finished - not yet.  He has one more tragedy waiting for me.  One far, far worse than all the rest.

He slipped in on a cold January morning and stole from me my heart, my sunshine, my joy.  He reached out with his icy cold hand, placed a gun to my son's head, and pulled the trigger.  In the box is the sound of a gunshot, the smell of gun powder, crimson red blood, shards of bone, and my precious son's lifeless body.  Never have I felt such pain.  How could I possibly survive this much anguish?  but somehow I kept on breathing.

My ex-husband follows our son in death four months later.  As the years had passed, he and I had become very close.  More so than when we were married.  Age had mellowed him.  I was still so numb from losing Christian that I felt nothing when I learned he had died.  It was as though I had no more capacity for heartache or pain.  I was empty and full all at the same time.

I wrap my arms tight around the box.  I place my cheek against the top.  Tears spill down and the box is covered in my tears.  I cry until there are no more tears to cry.  All of my memories are in that box.  All the mysteries of life and the mysteries of death.  I have lived them but I have yet to fully understand them.  Why so much death in one family?  in any family?

After Christian died, I cried out to Death again and again to take me; but that black-cloaked monster turned his back on me.  He would not return to claim me.  I would go on living.  Perhaps it was God's Hand that stopped him - held him back.  Perhaps my work on earth is not finished and I cannot leave until it is done.  Perhaps.

Please do not think that I believe that my son resides in either of the black boxes.  His ashes are in one, my memories of him are in the other; but his Spirit lives on.  That cannot be captured in a vessel - real or imagined.

He lives on!  He is in the sunshine that warms me; he is in the rain that makes the earth green; he is the colors in the rainbow;  he is in the power of lightening and thunder.  He blows in the wind and flies on the wings of an angel.  He lights up Heaven with his smile.  I feel his touch in the snowflakes that settles on my cheeks and on the tip of my nose.  I see him in the twinkling stars above and in the face of the moon.  He is the light reflected on the lake.  He is in the crashing waves on the shore.  He is in the snow on mountain peaks.  He is in the gentle breeze in the trees.

I see him when his sons smile.  I feel him in their hugs.  He surrounds me with his love.  He goes before me and prepares a place for me.  He will be there waiting for me when my times comes.

With these thoughts, I close my eyes and leave this secret, hidden place in my heart.  I put on my softest, warm pajamas, and climb into bed.  I lay my head down on soft pillows and pull the down comforter over me.  Tonight I will dream sweet dreams.

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From the "CITY OF ANGELS":

Seth:  Why do people cry?


Maggie:  What do you mean?

Seth:  I mean, what happens physically?


Maggie:  Well...umm...tear ducts operate on a normal basis to lubricate and protect the eye and when you have an emotion they overact and create tears.

Seth:  Why?  Why do they overact?


Maggie (pause):  I don't know.

Seth:  Maybe...maybe emotion becomes so intense your body just can't contain it.  Your mind and feelings become too powerful, and your body weeps.

TEACHINGS OF THE NATIVE AMERICANS

I hope there never comes a time when I fail to hear the voice within the raindrops splashing against my window; or see creation in the sunrise; or to cease feeling the urge to write poetry when waves crash against the shore; or to feel vulnerable when standing at the edge of a mountain cliff overlooking a vast forest of trees below; or to be in awe of a single snowflake; or to feel in the presence of God when looking at the reflected golden rays of the sun as it sets over the ocean.  I never want to be in such a hurry that I fail to see that single flower blooming all alone in the grass; or the first firefly of summer.  Life holds so much magic if only we observe and recognize the gifts put before us by a loving hand.

A little over a week ago Patrick and I went to the ocean for a couple of days.  On the way home we stopped at Christian's Roadside Memorial site.

I had been feeling so, so, so sorrowful for some time and just couldn't seem to overcome those horribly oppressive feelings ... not even the beautiful escape to the ocean brightened my mood.  I don't know that I had ever felt that bad for such an extended period of time before.  When Christian first left us, all I felt for the longest time was numbness.  Now two years and four months later I was really feeling the impact of his death - possibly for the first time.  My mental visions of him were so vibrant, my memories so clear, my longing to have him close to me so strong, my grief so overwhelming.  My tears so frequent, my emotions so raw.

The Memorial site is a very short distance from the place where he actually died.  Every time I have gone there, a hawk has circled over head.  Some times more than one.  Ancient Native Americans, and some tribes still today, believe that the hawk is a messenger bringing tidings from the Great Spirit; and hawk's cry signals the need for the beholder to heighten awareness and receive a message.  I am a believer in signs.  I don't  search for signs but I appreciate and try to recognize them when they come into my life.

On this visit to the Memorial site I walked the short distance to the place where my Christian died.  As I paused at that spot and looked down with an aching and broken heart, I saw lying there on the ground  a rock shaped like a heart.  Not a perfectly shaped heart but an easily recognizable heart.  A symbol of my broken heart.  I had looked down at that spot many, many times; if the rock had been there before, surely I would have seen it.  Instantly I felt this sense of great peace.  It was as though I almost heard Christian telling me that he loved me, that he understood the pain I was feeling, and that everything was going to be alright.  That heavy weight I had been feeling and carry around for so long was lifted from my heart as I bent down and picked up this very special gift.

Native Americans believe that hawk medicine allows us to intuitively and clearly understand the message that is being sent to us.  If that can be applied to what happened to me that day, I can't say for sure.  All I know for a certainty is that I came away believing that Christian had spoken to my heart.

From my experience through just the process of living life, I have discovered that in the silence of the quiet mind we become more receptive to the messages and gifts bestowed upon us.  It is also in that quiet place that we discover our own personal power, strength, and wisdom.

Life is a never-ending cycle of self-transformation.  My brothers and sisters in sorrow, as you well know we have been changed forever.  Our lives and how we look at life will never be the same; but even so, we continue to evolve and grow.  We lean on each other, we support each other, and we learn from each other.  We give of ourselves to one another.  One of the greatest lessons I have learned from you and from my own spiritual growth is that our loved ones continue to communicate with us from the great beyond.  They continue to show their love and concern for us.  They are there when we need them.  They send us small gifts to bring us understanding and peace.  And  for that I am so thankful.

I wish.....

I wish it were so but not every day is filled with sunshine and butterflies.  I wish I could tell you my fellow survivors, my dear friends,  that after so much time has passed that everything will be all better.  I wish that I could tell you that the sadness you feel will go away.   How I wish I could tell you that your pillow will never again become wet with your tears.  I wish I could tell you that the heaviness that surrounds your heart will be made lighter with time and eventually disappear.  So many things I wish I could tell you - could tell myself.


Time does not heal but in time we learn to live with the pain.  This is not any easy task but one that permits us to go on.  Allows us to put one foot in front of the other.


How many times have you felt you were just a shadow?   Sometimes it is very much like what I think an out-of-body experience must be like.   I see myself talking, walking around, smiling, laughing, doing every day things; but it's like I'm not really there.  I feel like an observer to my own life. 

  


I try so hard..... so very hard to be a whole person.  A real person.  A happy person.  I succeed only part of the time.  I like to think of myself as resilient, positive, and upbeat but lately my heart is so heavy.  I even find myself feeling impatient with others because I'm unhappy.  I try not to show it but I FEEL IT.


Don't you just hate that about grief?  You think you're going along just fine and then suddenly, out of no where, all that sadness sweeps in and pulls  you down  into a deep, dark funk.   I wish there was an easy answer.  I wish there was a way to wish ourselves out of that dark place.  Or even better, that we never went there in the first place. I even wish there was a pill I could take that would make me happy but there isn't.  I've tried the pills doctors prescribe but they don't take away the hurt.  They dull the fringes of emotions but they never reach the deep, devastating pain.  The enduring pain.


This is where "time" comes in.  I know that with time I'll start to feel better again.  I always do.  And when I do, I'm going to jump onto my surfboard and ride that wave called "hope" to the top and enjoy being there before cresting the wave.  Then I'll ride the wave for as far and for as long as I can.  I'll hold on tight, dug in with everything I've got,  and hope that I don't fall and crash.  But if I do, I'll pick myself up, brush off the sand, and climb back onto that board called "determination" and try again.  


Excuse me just a moment.  I can't seem to find my surfboard.  I know it's here somewhere.  Hey! has anyone seen my surfboard ... the one with the word "Determination" printed on it?  No?  Dang! I was hoping you'd seen it.  I'll just keep looking for it until I find it.  Its got to be here..... 


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Wishing and hoping that when the darkness arrives that it will pass quickly and the sunshine returns in abundance - to all of us. 

THE GARDEN

For a long time I felt alone and buried beneath a thick covering of suffocating grief.  I accepted this and thought of it as the way I would live the rest of my days.  Eventually, however, the isolation and depression became so oppressive that I began to feel not only listless but restless.  I wanted more.  I needed more.  Not a lot but something more than what I had.  I had lived this way for so long that I wasn't sure I was up to the challenge of trying to make changes.  If it was going to happen then I would have to begin to make changes within myself.  I had told myself this many times but for whatever reason I did nothing to change anything.

At the same time that I began to feel this way, Spring arrived.  I had been asking for a garden for many years.  The first year we moved here, we had a vegetable garden.  A beautiful, bountiful garden.  Then no more.

The white picket fence surrounding the garden is in need of repair and a coat of paint.  The wood around the raised beds had begun to decay.  The beds were overgrown with thick coverings of weeds.  Weeds had grown up in the walkways and a few trees had taken root and grown tall.  The work to restore it seemed too overwhelming.

My husband, Patrick, was still recovering from an extended illness and I had broken my left hand.  I thought another year would past without a garden.  Patrick knew that we both needed something to renew our spirits and give us something, other than ourselves, to think about.  Because of his illness, our financial resources were limited but after some mental deliberation, he decided it would be money well spent to hire someone to fix up the garden for us.  And, my oh my, how it did lift our spirits!  It got us out of the house and into the sunshine and fresh air.

We started seedlings inside the house and watched them sprout and grow.  He purchased plants to set out.  I bought seeds.  Together we put up trellises for the peas and cucumbers to grow up on.  After everything was in, we returned to the garden everyday to see if any of the seeds had broken through the soil.  We knew it would take time but still we walked out together to look.

We also placed a beautiful little Memorial in one corner of the garden for Christian.  On either side of the stone bench, Patrick hung hanging baskets of flowers.  Together we hung a wind chime my Mother had purchased for Christian in a tall rose bush.

While I was sitting in the garden one day, it dawned on me now much my own life paralleled that of a flower bulb or a seed in a neglected garden.  The following composition is the result of those thoughts.

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THE GARDEN

For so long I lay hidden in a dark, cold place

Buried deep, deep, deep beneath the ground

Early Spring brought the weight of soggy soil

Rainless, sunbaked Summers

Destroyed any hope of life beyond my grave

Suffocated with decaying leaves in the Fall

Snow blanketed and froze me in the Winter.

I didn't even struggle to be free

I was filled with too much hopelessness

I had no will to fight left in me

I lay there accepting this as my fate.

All the ills that nature could heap upon me

I accepted.

The years past and nothing changed.

I lay there barren, dormant, and alone.

Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.

Accepting, accepting, accepting.

Wanting nothing, changing nothing.

Existing but just barely.

One day I awoke to find the

Ground shaking all around me

I found myself rolling and tumbling

I lay there waiting to see 

What would happen next.

Shortly steel teeth raked the tumbled soil

And I found myself under a thin blanket 

Of rich, black earth.

Soon others were placed next to me

I couldn't see them but I knew they were there.

Gentle showers of sweet water fell all around

And puddled up before sinking deep

Bathing me in its hydrating moisture.

I felt the sun warming the soil.

Within myself things began to change

Slowly at first and then very quickly

It seemed to me.

Things that had been coiled up

Held in tight

Started to expand and push out

At last breaking through my hard shell.

Life supporting roots shot out

And pulled in the life giving water and nutrients.

I felt myself reaching for the light

I wanted to feel the warm sun.

I spread out my arms to receive

Its warmth.

Each day I grew a little more

Getting stronger and stronger.

After a while I could see

Above the soil line.

I could see my fellow sprouts

So green, so full of light

and life.

I found myself wanting 

To be strong again.

Above my dark grave

The earth was beautiful

And I wanted to grow taller and taller

I reached, I stretched

I pulled myself up and out

The bulb that gave me strength

Beat like a hundred little hearts.

I was free.  Free at last to breathe.

Part of me would remain

Forever buried beneath the soil

And I knew there would come a time

When conditions would get hard to bear

A time when leaves will fall, 

Snow will bury me beneath

Its icy blanket. 

A time when my strength would wane

And I would coil up tight within myself.

But now I know that Spring will return

The sun will come back and warm me

Gente rain will bath me.

My strength will return and when it does

I will pull myself up and grow tall and strong

My fellow survivors and I will welcome

Each other back with loving, 

Encouraging words and thoughts.

We will feel the sun on our faces

If a strong wind blows, we will bend

But we will not break

We will lean upon each other for support.

The rain may beat us down from time to time

But when it stops we will stand tall

Adversity may slow us down

But it will not stop our growth

Or hold us down for long.

And when others stop and gaze upon us

They will marvel at our ability to survive

Marvel at our resilience.

And they will say amongst themselves

That we are the most beautiful flowers

In all the garden.