Aug. 31: 9:15 am. I woke up to sunshine and cool air drifting through my open window. As I lay in bed, appreciating the loveliness of the morning, I wondered where Mom was and how the evening had gone. All night I had dreamed that she had died and I’d been trying to figure out how we were to all going to be OK. Lying there in bed, and actually, now as I sit and type on my front porch, I have a stronger sense of being loved by everything around me. The tree feels maternal…the wind seems to caress…
So I talked to Mom and told her that I didn’t know how I was going move forward and make her absence OK for all those who need her. I don’t know how I am going to make things OK for Michael and Maretta and Joe and Dad and Terry and for everyone who loves and needs her so much. So I asked for her help. I asked her to assist not just me but everyone in her circle so we can all help each other and make this OK. I don’t want her death to be a detriment, a blackened mark in our lives. I don’t want me or the kids to be lesser, sadder people because of this loss. I know that not having her here, with us, guiding and inspiring us is a loss and a sadness that we will always have. But I’d like us to find opportunities for this massive life change to make us deeper, more compassionate people who breathe life ever more deeply. I hope that having lost the person who is the core of so much of what we do that we can find loving, wonderful ways of weaving that gap together so that we become a strong community with fewer members but perhaps greater spirit.