Faith and Politics in 2020 - My Why for My Vote

This is my why for 2020.  This is why I am voting for Joe Biden and Kamela Harris.  

I see no reason to justify my vote, so don’t think that this post is about that.  As I write these words, I clearly remember so many political conversations from 2016, so I guess in some circles, I will need to justify my vote.  It seemed the focus of those conversations in 2016 were always on Hillary Clinton and the Dems and somehow the jest of those conversations ended up being boiled down to this one question:  How can you say you are a Christian and vote for Hillary?  Let’s face it; that question is still asked in 2020: “How can you vote for Biden and say you are a Christian?”

I am a Christian.  I am also pretty much a lifelong democrat.  I came of age in the 60’s and even though I had been raised in a home that identified as Christian and Democrat, I found I was out of step with the political leanings of those whose political discussions I had long listened to as a child and as a teen.  The reason I was out of step had to do with race, civil rights, the Vietnam War, and the long held belief that I had that Jesus came down on the side of those fighting for civil rights and against those supporting going to war.  

When I first became a Christian, when I first decided to follow Jesus, I was a young girl not yet in my teens, and I was the first in my family to take that step of actually saying I was a follower of Jesus. 

My religious life has been one of taking a few twists and turns along the way.  I won’t go into that now.  That is a story for another day.  I guess I can sum it up by saying that even when the doctrine of the religious system of which I was a part did not line up with Biblical Christianity, this quote by Marilynne Robinson’s from one of my favorite books of all time “Gilead” was ringing true to me. 

““Christianity is a life, not a doctrine . . . I’m not saying never doubt or question. The Lord gave you a mind so that you would make honest use of it. I’m saying you must be sure that the doubts and questions are your own.” ”

— Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

I love that last part of the quote so much.  The Lord does give you a mind, and I fully believe that if you doubt or question your faith or your political beliefs, just make sure those doubts and questions are your own.  It is a good thing to explore what you truly believe regarding all influences upon your life.  I had to do that at a major turning point in my life in my late thirties.

My true faith and my true beliefs are based on what the Bible says about the person of Jesus and about His Church.  He said,  “…I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” (Matt. 16:18).  My faith is not divorced from my political /world views.  My faith informs my political/world views.  I also read extensively in both the fiction and non-fiction genres on matters of faith, history, culture, and social structures.  I truly believe God wants us to understand the world and social system in which He has placed us.  That is why I read.

In the final analysis, my politics, which are mine, not someone else’s, must line up with what I read in the entirety of the Bible which I read every single day for at least thirty minutes a day.  My life also must line up with what I believe.  Again, to quote Marilynne Robinson, “Christianity is life, not a doctrine…” 

I’ve often found myself out of step with others fellow believers in matters of politics.  That is ok with me because I am not a follower of some man nor do I wish to follow some man-made doctrine.  I generally find myself voting as a political moderate, but in the last years I am finding our political landscape is far from moderate everywhere I look.  That is why I must more and more lean into my faith to inform my political actions when it comes to speaking with others, writing, and voting.  

Christianity is about love and justice, the love and justice of God as lived out in our midst by the Word made manifest in the person of Jesus who was fully God and fully man.  I am called to follow Him and walk in love while showing justice and mercy.  

I see no love and no justice in the current administration in the White House.  Under Donald Trump I have never seen love and acceptance and grace and mercy on display.  I have seen no empathy, no regard for the citizens he has a responsibility to care for and serve.  He seems to delight in and shows partiality to those who sow chaos.  He favors doing favors for those he expects to do favors for him.  He is not a truth teller.  He is not a truth seeker.  He only is self-seeking and self-serving.  I believe he is anti-social and a threat to the democracy which I hold dear.  

Let me be clear, I am not speaking just about Donald Trump when I write these words.  I am speaking of Trumpism. I believe that those who continually spread his conspiracy theories, embrace his toxic messages, and refuse to explore who and what they are really supporting when they support and rally around Trump and Trumpism  remind me of those locked in cult mentality. They are complicit in supporting his anti-social and bullying ways.  I pray they can be released from the clutches of this demonizing, demoralizing, anti-democratic philosophy.  

My vote is for truth, for love, for justice, and for supporting the high ideals upon which this nation was founded.  My vote is for the Biden/Harris ticket.  

September Song ~ September is Suicide Prevention Month

September, you are both a hard and a glorious month.

September, you remind me of new pencils, new books, new school shoes, football games, and chili simmering on the stove.

I first became a mom in September.

First born son Ryan born on a September day when I was 21 marked the day motherhood officially became the best job I ever had, and my favorite.

In September, when I was a young mother, the peach trees in the backyard became heavy with fruit that did not wait patiently for the for the harvest. When the peaches were ready, they were ready. They had to picked, processed, and preserved.

My two sons posing in front of a peach tree heavy with peaches waiting to be picked. September 1979

There was a time in September, when I would walk out onto the back deck of our home and I could smell the fall air rich with the smell of grapes ready to harvested.

The air had cooled, and the first light frost would have set the flavors in the grapes.
Now it was time to make grape juice and grape jelly.

Grape harvest: Sally and Julie

The grapes had to heated and crushed to make the wonderful, sweet tasting juice.

Now, September brings me reminders of crushing grief.

September is Suicide Awareness Month.

Ten years ago, a verse was added to my September song that I didn't see coming.

I did not want this verse in my song.

This verse tells a story about a chapter in my life that I did not want included.

And, yet, because I have this verse in my song, I must raise my voice and sing, or speak, since I am not much of a singer.

The songs I knew by heart, the ones that had verses I would sing each September changed that terrible year when I experienced the death of my dearly beloved daughter Julie by suicide. Now, September reminds me that it is Suicide Awareness Month.

The first night I returned home after my daughter's suicide, I wondered how I would make it.

I no longer understood anything about my life.

My past made no sense.

My future...well, I couldn't even foresee a future because I was trying to make sense of the present. 

“Catastrophic loss is like undergoing a loss of our identity”

— Jerry Sittser " A Grace Disguised"

This quote spoke to me like little else I read after Julie’s death

I had experienced a major loss of my identity when I lost my daughter to suicide.

I didn't know who I was.
The script of my life had been altered.
A verse in my song had be thrust in that made every verse before it seem discordant and out of rhythm.

A dear friend, one the first ones I called to tell of Julie's death, came to Julie's funeral and gave me a book. It was called, My Beautiful Broken Shell. The title spoke to me. It was a picture book which was perfect because I really could not read books yet. I was too crushed. So this book was perfect for me at that time.

I read the book the first night I was home from spending a week with my family near the place where Julie had lived and died.  When I climbed into my bed that night I was too numb to  fathom how I would get up and live the next morning.

The narrator in the book tells of walking along the beach of an ocean. As most of us do at the beach, she begins to look for shells. She comes across a broken scallop shell, but leaves it search of a perfect shell.

Then, she see the broken shell as a metaphor for her broken heart. She also realizes that this shell had not been totally crushed by the pounding surf. She realizes she can learn from brokenness.
She also learns she will need

courage
 to remain on the beach,

courage
to live with the pain she is feeling,

courage
to not embrace
a vision of a perfect shell,

and she would need

courage
to embrace brokenness.


The message of the book spoke to me.
I knew with the Lord's help I could live with my broken heart.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted;
and those who are crushed in spirit He saves.”

— Psalm 34:18

The message of the book spoke to me. I knew with the Lord's help I could live with my broken heart.
Life was not perfect. It was never intended to be. Day by day, I would learn to live as a broken person in a broken world. I learned I could only do this by grace that was given me by the Lord who said He would be with me, the brokenhearted.

---

I reflected on the new verse of my September song,
the verse that speaks of loss, remembrance, and broken hearts.
This verse in my song now is sung every September when I am reminded that it is once again
Suicide Prevention Month.

Thankfully, this particular verse does not end in hopelessness.
It ends in hope and healing.

Despite the verse in my song that I did not want included,
there is a refrain that is repeated throughout the song of my life.
The refrain speaks of
joy,
hope,
healing,
and of the faithfulness of God,
who now holds my sweet Julie in His arms
and comforts me with His presence.
He sends me
people,
so many wonderful people,
who have loved and supported me and my family.

This is my September song.
It is a beautiful song because it speaks of love.
A mother's song always begins and ends with love.

Julie ~ A Blog Post and A Birthday Celebration During the Time of COVOD 19

Today, my daughter should have turned forty-four years old.

We should have been celebrating my daughter’s birthday with her today.

Julie, my youngest daughter, my fourth child, was born on this day forty-four years ago. As only a mom can do, I recalled details of that day which belong only to me. As I think of listing those details, I wonder if anyone would even care what those details were other than Julie because after all, she is the one who most likely would have been interested in the details of her birth.

If she were alive, as evidenced by this recent FaceBook comment that showed up in my memories, she might have even wondered what I would be saying about her and her birthday on social media.

In 2009, when Julie inquired if she would get a blog post of “17 paragraphs,” she did indeed get a blog post written by me in which I celebrated her birth and her life.

A year later, in April of 2010, we celebrated Julie’s birthday in grand style with a huge family birthday celebration. I snapped many pictures that day of Julie surrounded by her sisters and some of just Julie and her dog. On that day, we never could have imagined that Julie would die by suicide just six weeks later.

Keicha, Julie, Amy ~ Sisters

Julie and Phoenix

Now, here we are ten years later. It seems hard to even imagine that a decade has passed since I last not only saw Julie alive, but also since we as a family celebrated her and her life with her in our midst. It seems hard to imagine what my youthful, impish, springtime fairy would be like if she were alive today and celebrating her forty-fourth birthday. She always had such a sense of fun and of whimsy. Would she still? She loved playing around with her nieces and nephews. Now, they are teens and young adults. I often wonder what her interactions with them at this stage of life would be like.

Julie joking around with her nieces and nephews at the Salt Lake Zoo as she pretended she was being eaten by a giant lion.

Julie’s birth and life brought so much joy to our family. She was the fourth child born to a family of five children. She moved easily between the brother/sister relationship and the sister/sister relationship. I often think of her as our family lynchpin, the one who seemed to hold the parts and pieces of our complicated family structure together. Her life is one that is easy to celebrate because she brought so much joy to us all.

And so on her birthday this year, I decided I wanted to go to the cemetery where her ashes are buried to celebrate her and the joy her life brought to my life. Little did I know that as with everything these days, that simple exercise of going to the cemetery for a moment of remembrance would become complex.

Grief and Birthday Celebrations in The Time of COVID 19

Grief seems to be a constant these days.  All of us seem to be suffering from a deep communal grief.  And yet for those of us whom have recently lost loved ones, or for those of us whom experience anniversary date grief, it seems that the normal grief responses are made all the more complex in these days of the novel coronavirus.  

 For me personally, I think the weight of grief has been a constant in my life for over a year as I experienced anticipatory grief as my younger sister and my mother have both been in the last days of their lives.  In September of 2019, my sister passed away, and then just one month ago, on March 2, 2020, my mother passed away at the age of 103.

 Normally, we would have already had a memorial service for my mother, and we would have gathered at the cemetery as a family to inter her ashes.  None of that has happened because of COVID 19.  Not only that, I don’t even know when we will be able to have services for her.  This disruption to the normal grief journey seems to have compounded the complex feelings of grief that I have felt since of her death.

 For the past twenty-seven days, my husband and I have self-isolated and have only left the house to either walk around the neighborhood each day or to go to the grocery store to pick up pre-ordered groceries.  Today, the day that marked my daughter’s birthdate, I told my husband I wanted to go to the cemetery to visit my daughter’s grave, and to visit the gravesite of my parents.  

 As we approached the cemetery, I began to worry that it might not be open.  I did not anticipate there being people around because no one is having funerals or formal burials at this time.  I did not even have flowers to place on the graves because I didn’t want to enter a store to buy flowers, and we have nothing in bloom at our home.

 Driving towards the section of the cemetery where my daughter is buried, I noticed that a car was parked in the same area where we usually park.  As we drove closer, I said to my husband, “It looks like someone else is near Julie’s gravesite.”  

 It took me us driving right up to the car that was parked on the road for me to realize that my daughter, her fiancé, and my granddaughter were the people gathered at Julie’s grave.  My daughter lives in northern Colorado, about two hours away from us, and I did not know she planned on coming to town.   I honestly did not know what to do when we parked the car and I realized who was there.  

 My daughter, very private in her expressions of grief, was on the ground crying in front of her sister’s grave.  My feelings and emotions were all over the place.  Should I leave her in the privacy of her grief moment, or should I go to her?  I was more concerned about how to support her than I was about the social distancing practices that I have strictly adhered to for weeks.  It honestly did not even occur to me to ask myself, should we stay six feet apart?  Or, should I put on my mask?  No, I just followed my mother’s heart and rushed to her side to give her comfort.  I also wanted to feel her arms around me.  I wanted her to give me comfort too.

 We didn’t visit long.  It all seemed awkward in a way.  I had interrupted my daughter’s private visit.  I felt guilt for rushing in to give and receive hugs.  I worried that I might have passed along this terrible virus, and I worried that I might have picked up the dreaded virus from my family even as I knew that they too had been careful about practicing social distancing.  

 These times are not normal.  They are not natural.  So many of those practices that give us comfort and support during difficult times have been stripped away.  The normal responses of giving and receiving hugs must be restricted.  

 Quite honestly, I’ll never forget how comforting it was to feel Amy’s hug and to smell her signature perfume as my face brushed against her hair.  

 Unfortunately, I also know that I will never forgive myself if I unknowingly transferred a potentially deadly virus to her.  I also know that she would never forgive herself if she transferred that same virus to me.  I just hope she realizes that if she did, it will not be her fault.  It will be mine.  I was the one who threw caution aside.  I hope nothing bad comes from my impulsivity.  Too late, after the hugs, I went to the car and got my mask.

 We took photos.  Amy brought beautiful flowers for Julie.  They were perfect because the bouquet had bright, colorful flowers in it that included gerbera daisies, the same flowers we selected to blanket Julie’s casket when she died.  

 Then, Amy handed me flowers.  That girl.  She is always so thoughtful.  I don’t think she has ever visited me in the last ten years or more that she has not brought me flowers.  She had daffodils for me, and a note.  She had intended to leave the flowers and the note on my porch as a surprise as they left town.

The note said, “Love you lots, mom. Thinking of you on this trying day. I wish I could give you a big hug. xoxo Amy.”

 Too soon, we said our goodbyes.  My husband joked that lunch was on him this time, but they could buy the next time they came to town.  It was all so odd. We couldn’t even go to lunch.

 Grief in the time of COVID 19 brings such weird and unexpected twists and turns.  Time will tell what it all means in the days to come.  In the meantime, Julie’s birthday was celebrated in a very unusual way, and she got a blog post. I didn’t count the paragraphs.

Light

My mother, an artist, taught me to see landscapes with the eye of an artist.
Don’t look and just see the mountain, she said.
See the light.
See the shadows.
See how the hues of green change according to light or shadow.

Perhaps she hoped I too would become an artist. I did not have that talent bestowed upon me, but I did begin to see the world around me with the eye of an artist. I became fascinated with the nuances that could be found in a landscape as it would change throughout the day according to the light.

Light brings with it an awakening,
an awareness that the scene before us is not dull, flat, and boring.
Light shows us that nothing ever stays the same.
Light shows us that change is to be welcomed.

Light dances with shadow right before our eyes.
As light dances, she shows us depth, and nuance.
Light shines and subtlety changes to become distinct.
Shaded gradation changes scale.
That which seemed to loom large before us fades to the background and becomes smaller.

Yes, light, changes the very images before our eyes to give an entirely new spectrum.

Light shines on a flower and the petals become translucent.
Light shines on a life and the person becomes transformed.

Light can’t be fully understood until one considers darkness.
Sometimes, we must see and experience darkness before we can fully appreciate light.
Darkness can hide the mountain in front of us to the point where we doubt the mountain’s very existence.

Shadows distort our view and our perceptions of what we are seeing or not seeing.
That which we thought we could see clearly becomes unfathomable.
The darkness can seem to be impenetrable.

Shadow,
opaqueness,
replace that which we thought we could see clearly in the light.

Opaqueness does not allow us to see through her.
She does not wish to be transparent.
She shuns the light.
preferring the darkness,
a darkness that comes from hiding from the light

yet,

there is a darkness of the soul that seeks not to hide from the light.
That darkness seeks to find light again.
Even in the darkest of nights, that soul longs again for light.
That soul does not fear the dawning that comes with light.

My mother’s words and her teachings about light and shadow and the hues to be found when one searches for the full spectrum of color before them taught me more about how to view life than her words taught me about how to conceptualize the scene before me so I could capture it through artistic expression.

I’ve learned
light and life are fleeting.

Light taught me that change comes quickly.
Her very nature teaches that we must capture the beauty of life and light in the moment.
Light does not need our permission to shift, nor can her shifts be predicted.
She reminds not wait to for the light to become better, brighter, fuller.
Now is the moment to enjoy what light has to offer.

One fall evening at sunset, pulled from my desk by the changing light outside my window,
alive to the moment, 
I went outside seeking beauty.

I wanted to see the interplay of light and shadow.

While the sky changed from blue to orange,
light’s ability to disperse color across a broader spectrum
changed not just the clouds in the sky,
she also transformed the simple grasses of the field by lending them a bit of her glow.

Light
magical,
mystical,
I can’t begin to capture you in
photos,
paintings,
words.
Perhaps you are there just to enlighten my mind and my soul.

Light.
You came to lead us out of the darkness.
Light.
Now we no longer have to walk in the darkness.
Light.
Help us to truly see as we walk in the light.

Joy ~ The Third Week of Advent

Joy is not my overriding emotion these days. It is the third week of Advent, but if I am being honest with myself, and if I am to write a few words on the topic of joy, I must state from the beginning that joy is not the emotion that I am feeling. In fact, I find myself asking, “Just what is joy?” “Where does it come from?” “Is it an emotion?” “Why joy?” “Is it just some other response that I am to have because after all it is Christmas, and aren’t I expected to feel joy?”

I’ll be honest, I’m feeling a lot of sadness this year. Sadness seems to be more present in my being than joy.

I’m in a place of grief. Grief that I haven’t adequately addressed. In many ways, I feel as if I have been in a state of grief for the entire year of 2019 as I watched my youngest sister Suzanne’s health decline until her death at the end of September. Even though we were separated by great distance, she was in California and I was in Colorado, we kept in touch nearly on a daily basis through phone calls and texts. It was in that contact that I took comfort because she was still with us, and I held out hope that she would get well. When the word came that she had been admitted to hospice and that there was no longer anything that could be done for her, I honestly thought my grief would knock me to ground. How would I face losing my baby sister? I was twelve when she was born. She had always seemed almost more like my child than my sister, and yet over the years we had formed a very solid sister bond that I think helped both of us navigate difficult days and relationships.

I told myself that I should steel myself for the inevitable. She would not last long. She lasted a week. In that week, I could relate so much with Frederick Buechner’s words in The Eyes of The Heart when he wrote of the days before his brother’s death when the inevitability of his impending death was “was too harrowing to think about.”

Yes, such thoughts were harrowing to me. And so, even in those last days and moments, I tried to be there for her by sending flowers to cheer her soul and speaking a word or two of comfort to her through her children who were by her side. Thankfully, I was even able to FaceTime with her just before she passed away and she fluttered her eyes open for me in recognition. I thought my heart would split wide open at the moment because I knew that would be the very last time I would ever see her beautiful brown eyes.

Unfortunately, life did not stop being complicated just because I was feeling sad and wanted to just take some time off to grieve. And so, I have kept on moving and doing.

Meanwhile, the other slow decline of heath that has been going on in my immediate family during the last year has speeded up. About a month after my sister’s death, my mother was admitted to hospice care. At 103 she is failing. As if that were not enough to deal with emotionally, I am also dealing with very complex family dynamics regarding my mother’s care. This too has been an ongoing problem for the past several years.

It all has taken a toll on my life. How is one to find joy in such times?

Today, just days before Christmas, I’m just very sad, and quite frankly, I don’t even feel like celebrating Christmas at all. "Can we just skip Christmas?" I want to ask. Actually, I think I voiced those words out loud to my daughters. “Let’s just not do Christmas this year. Let’s skip it.”

Yet, even though I recognize the need I have to grieve well, and even as I want to skip Christmas, I also find that I am purposefully holding space in my heart for joy.

In doing this, I am learning that at such times, holding space for joy means that one must fill up that place where joy may not yet be present by holding on to hope that joy will again be felt.

Yes, it through hope, I have learned, that I’m holding space for joy.

Just creating this table helped me begin to walk into that place where joy comes from because as I placed items upon the table, I began to realize that the item selection seemed to give expression to an expectation that joy would visit my heart even as it seemed bound up in sadness.

Joy is an expectation that we feel because we have hope.

Christmas is about hope, and it is also about joy, not the joy that the world expects, but the joy that is spoken about by Habakkuk when he realized that joy would not come from the things of this earth.

In fact, he realized that even if he had no figs, no olive oil, no flocks, and no herds, he would rejoice in the Lord. He said despite the expected coming of hard times, despite the possibility of being stripped of everything, even the possibility of not having food to eat, he would “rejoice in the Lord.” Why? Because he knew the source of joy. He knew that joy would never come from the things of this world. Where did he find joy? He said, “I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”

*********

Many years ago during a time of loss and uncertainty, I purchased a wall plaque with the scripture from Psalm 30:5 written on it. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. I hung on to those words with hope when I was not feeling any joy at all. And, the promise was true. I again found and felt great joy.

After my daughter died nearly ten years ago, I again looked to those words from the Psalms with great hope, knowing the words were true, even if my heart was not feeling them.

I wish I could explain the peace and joy that came to me in some of my darkest hours, but I cannot. This sense of joy and the peace I felt were supernatural. They could not be explained. They were a work of Holy Spirit ministering in me.

**********

I’m finding that joy and hope are more linked than I had realized before this year. I’ve learned this truth as I’ve reflected on the space I created in my home that reflects joy to me whenever I look at it.

The plants on my table I am dubbing “My Joy Table” mostly consist of plants that must live in the dark for a time before they will bloom. The one amaryllis has lived in the dark cool place of my basement closet since last Christmas. I’m not sure if the bulb will bloom this year now that it is again in the light, and now that it is receiving water, but I have hope. I tell myself that this bulb produced leaves and buds and flowers last year, surely it will do so again this year. I know the rules of growing such things. I’ve followed them. This bulb should produce a flower. I have hope based on what I know about the plant, but then again, maybe it won’t bloom this year. Maybe this year is not its year to break forth and bring beauty to those who look at her. Maybe she just wants to be quiet this year. That is ok. Some years we just don’t feel like blooming, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t have hope, and that doesn’t mean that our days of giving and receiving joy are over, it just means that we are in a place where we have not been in years past.

We should not place too much pressure on ourselves when we are feeling grief. We must not try to conjure up joy. Our feelings are legitimate, and we must honor their true nature. If we are sad, we are sad. It does not mean that we don’t feel a sense of joy that is yet to come, or even that deep in our hearts we feel joy that cannot give way to the expression that others might expect from us.

And so, my joy table has an amaryllis bulb that does not appear to be on the path producing blooms this year. I’m accepting this bulb for being where she is. Blooming is up to her, not me. As a back-up, I bought a new bulb because quite honestly, I needed to have a blooming amaryllis in my house.

My sis Suzanne would send a beautiful a pot of blooming amaryllis’ to our Mother nearly every year. Each year my mother would tend to the bulbs, store them in a closet after they were done blooming, and then these bulbs would be recused from the dark closet and brought into the light and would produce beautiful blooms year after year.

Last year, I asked Mother if she had gotten her amaryllis out of the closet and if they were blooming yet. She didn’t know what I was talking about. She didn’t know what an amaryllis was. She told my sister Suzanne that she didn’t remember her ever sending her those plants. She said she’d never seen an amaryllis. She asked what they looked like and claimed she’d never owned one. Suzanne was hurt, but soon, she too realized that Mother was slipping away from us in her mind and it was not because she didn’t appreciate the beautiful gifts Suzanne had sent her. Little did I know then, while Suzanne and I discussed that Mother no longer recognized the names of the plants she always grew or remembered that she grew them, that by the next Christmas Suzanne would be gone from our midst, and I would be grieving over her death that still seems so unreal to me. And, my mother’s mind is also steadily slipping away from her too as her body continues to weaken and fail.

**********

In times of loss and change, when all that has always been a part of our lives begin to slip away, how are we to find joy? We are not all prophets like Habakkuk. We are just everyday people trying to get through difficult seasons in our lives during a season that is filled with many demands and expectations. Are we to light the Joy candle on the third candle of Advent and just gimly acknowledge that this word joy just does not apply to our lives this year? Are we supposed to just move through the season and hope that things improve so that next year we will feel joyful? If joy is an emotion, then I think many of us are left wondering how we manufacture such an emotion when we believe we have little in our lives that bring joy.

It is in these seasons when joy is not present because of our circumstance that I think that we finally learn that joy is produced by a work of the Holy Spirit. For that reason, I have white doves on the table to represent both the Holy Spirit and to represent the peace that comes from above.

********

Again, without even realizing it, I realized after I added a small figurine of Tiny Tim and his father Bob Cratchit to my table that their presence represent the joy that came into their lives because Ebenezer Scrooge saw himself for the miserly person that he was before he was changed by the spirits who him visited on Christmas Eve. Their lives were transformed because Ebenezer Scrooge was transformed. That is a story of Christmas that we all love.

At a recent gathering that I attended that was held for mothers who have lost children, we were reminded that Ebenezer Scrooge may have been given the name Ebenezer because Dickens was making reference to Ebenezer, the stone set up by Samuel as memorial after the people had defeated the Philistines. Ebenezer means “stone of the help.” It was set up so that the people would remember that “till now the Lord has helped us.”

This recounting of the significance of the name Dickens gave Scrooge reminded me that the writing group that I have been working with this year has committed to remembering to mark those times when we too can say, “I will mark this time with an Ebenezer, a stone of help,” so that we can remember the faithfulness of the Lord.

This practice of marking those times when I realize that up to this point the Lord has helped me, and then marking that time with an Ebenezer has been an important practice for me. In those times, when I recognize a point in time when I could figuratively speaking erect an Ebenezer, I find myself saying, “The Lord has been with me up until this point, and look what has gone on in my life before this time. Surely, he will continue to be with me in the future. He will not abandon me here.”

Why would I doubt that my God won’t continue to be faithful?

Why would I doubt that my God will not use these days of sorrow to bring a harvest of joy?

Have I forgotten that he has promised us joy in the journey?

***********

Yet, honestly, sometimes I still realize when I look to the expectations and demands of the season I find joy seeping out of me and being replaced with anxiety and dread. I have my eyes on expectations and demands rather than on the message of the season.

I recently saw a meme that said, “Don’t try to fulfill all the hopes and dreams and expectations that others have of the season. Remember Jesus already did that when he came to earth as the word made flesh to dwell among us.”

This babe whose birth we celebrate on Christmas is Immanuel, God with us. The One who came to dwell among us. Jesus himself tells in John 15 that we are to live in His love just as He has lived in His Father’s love. Abide in Him. Abide in His love. And why did he tell us these things? Jesus said, “These things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.”

There is the source of joy. Do you see it? Don’t miss it.

Joy is found in abiding in the love of Jesus.

I pray I don’t lose sight of that truth this season. I pray that I don’t take my eyes off of this truth as I move through the demands of the season with a heart that is feeling the heaviness of grief. My Ebenezer table, my table of joy, is set up to remind me that indeed, “joy always comes in the morning,” and that I am to find my “joy in the God of my salvation” just as Habakkuk of old did.

The season alone does not bring us true and everlasting joy.

The trappings of the season do not bring us true and everlasting joy.

The festivities and family gatherings do not brings us true and everlasting joy.

That is not what this season is really about.

This is season is about the gift given us, the One we celebrate during this season.

He is the One who brings us joy.

Thoughts on The First Week of Advent ~ Thoughts on Hope

Hope

How does hope survive during days of

broken 

promises,

broken dreams,

broken lives?

How does hope survive when all we see are

broken people?

How do we hope to survive when we are the 

broken ones?

When we are the 

broken people?

In our brokenness,

we promise ourselves that we will 

do better, 

be better, 

make things better.

We never do.

We never can.

We are broken.

How can we make things better?

We hear the promises of others when they say they will

do better,

be better,

make things better.

Hope.

We hope for better

health,

friendships,

relationships,

family dynamics,

places to live,

jobs,

grades,

educational opportunities.

We hope for better outcomes

in encounters with others,

in sports events,

medical tests,

test scores in the classroom.

We long for things to be as they should be.

We hope that one whom

upsets us, 

disappoints us,

ignores us,

won’t speak to us,

lies to us,

steals from us,

uses us,

hurts us,

will see the error of his or her ways

 and 

do better,

be better,

make things better.

Hope.

Oh, hope can seem like such an empty word when promises are broken.

We want to scream to the promise breaker,

“That promise you made to me was broken.

Do I even dare to trust you again?”

You broke my heart.

You broke my trust.

You have left me broken.

We ask ourselves, 

“How can I even begin to fix a broken dream?”

We ask others,

 the ones whom have shattered our hearts, 

broken our trust,

“How do you plan to fix my heart, the one you shattered?”

“How will you fix the trust you have broken?”

Dreams have a quality about them that deems them unbreakable.

Who would ever dream of broken dreams?

When one dreams, one dreams that the dream will never be broken.

Broken dreams.

Broken lives.

We pass them on the street.

We see broken lives with outstretched hands as we walk pass them on the street

where they stand on street corners,

with signs that say,

“Hungry.”

“Anything helps.”

Broken people.

They sit with me at the Thanksgiving table.

 They call me on the phone.

They are my people.

I am one of them.

I too am broken.

I am also a fixer.

I want to fix every broken thing.

I do not want to toss anything aside that I think can be fixed.

I want every relationship to be fixed.

I want every heart to be mended.

I want every heart repaired.

I can fix nothing because

I

too

am 

broken.

Where does this leave me?

Where do I go from here?

Like David, I cry out,

Lead me to the Rock that is higher than I.

I am filled with longing for all things to be made right.

I can’t make things right for myself or for others.

I need a redeemer,

A savior.

 I don’t want to lose hope.

Hope, it cannot be placed in me or in others.

I am hopeless.

I can’t be the one in whom you place your hope.

I too am broken.

None of us can

do better,

be better,

make things better,

because all of us are broken.

Where is that Rock whom is higher than I?

Where is the anchor for 

my life,

my soul?

To that Rock I want to cling.

Without that Rock,

I too would be like those of old,

those whom passed through the land distressed and hungry,

and when they were hungry, they were enraged and spoke contemptuously against their king and their God.

They looked to the earth, but all they saw was distress, darkness and gloom of anguish.

They were thrust into thick darkness.*

There was no hope.

There is no hope.

The longing for hope.

The longing for One higher than I.

The longing for a Rock to which I can cling is the longing of our hearts.

We groan inwardly with all creation waiting for redemption. **

We long for hope.

We long for Advent.

The coming.

Advent is now.

It is upon us.

On the first Sunday of Advent we are given hope.

“The people who walked in darkness

Have seen a great light;

Those who dwelt in deep darkness,

On them has light shone. ***

Jesus,

The child is born,

The son is given to us. ****

He, this child, is our hope.

In my brokenness,

my longing for all things to be made right,

in my longing 

for healing of 

bodies,

minds,

relationships,

I know of no other

Healer,

Restorer,

Giver of Peace,

Except the One called

Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. *****

Jesus,

The Word made flesh dwelt among us. ******

He restores our hope and renews our hearts and minds.

He binds up our wounds.

I hope in Him.

He is my hope.

He is the Rock higher than I.

I will look to Him.  

I will hold fast to my confession of hope without wavering,

For he who promised is faithful.

In this season I don’t want to miss the greatest gift of all.

Jesus.

He is my hope.

I don’t have to hope in others, 

in dreams, 

in hopes that I have created in my own mind, 

that I hope to achieve in my own strength.

I have the hope the world long awaited,

The longing of every broken heart,

Jesus.

Yes, 

He alone is my hope.

*Isaiah 8:21-22

**Romans 8:22

***Isaiah 9:2

****Isaiah 9:6

*****Isaiah 9:6

******John 1:14

*The photos of the stained glass window were taken in the old United Presbyterian Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where I grew up. As a child, I was always fascinated by these windows and have so many fond memories of listening to sermons, praying, singing hymns, and listening to my mother’s beautiful soprano voice sing beautiful solos while I pondered the beauty of it all.

Just Breathe

It is the time of year when we have the tendency to tell ourselves that we don’t even have time to take a breath. Do you find yourself feeling that way?

If so, take a moment and just breathe.

Do you have an app on your phone that teaches you to breathe? Years ago, we would have laughed at such a question, but now, I find that I actually use an app on my phone to help me take deep breaths when I am feeling anxious, stressed or overwhelmed. We live in interesting times when you think about how we depend on our devices to remind us to

just breathe.

Thoughts about:

breath

breTH

noun

the air taken into or expelled from the lungs

The scriptures speak to us of breath. I find it interesting that when Job was feeling that his life had no hope, he spoke about breath.

He said,

Remember that my life is like a breath;

my eye will never again see good.

Job 7:7

In his depression, breath reminded him of the brevity of life.

The Psalmist uses the word breath as a metaphor to illustrate this same truth about life.

Man is like a breath;

His days like a passing shadow.

Psalm 144:4

Breathing. It’s pretty important.

It is after all what keeps us alive.

I don’t think I ever really thought about breathing until I was about to give birth the first time. That is when I was first taught about rhythmic breathing. I was told to breathe through the labor pains. That seemed like such a weird concept to me at the time, but soon I learned that what the nurses were telling me was right. Breathing through the pain helped me move through the pain and allowed me to work with my body instead of against it as it began the process of giving birth to another human being.

Oh, the miracle of it all.

My breathing was helping to bring breath to another human being.

Breath.

I had the blessing of watching all of my five children take the first breath of life.

Again, oh, the miracle of it all.

In the last few days of my father’s life, as he struggled to breath through the effects of congestive heart failure, I had the blessing of holding my father’s hand and saying,

“Breathe in.”

“Breathe out.”

My therapist once told me that she noted that I was

holding my breath.

When I wanted to just get through something that was painful, or when I was stressed, or anxious, or worried, she said she noticed I was holding my breath and pushing through the hardness of it all.

Do you do that?

She was right. I was holding my breath when I just wanted to get through something. When I wanted to just get that thing behind me, I would barely even breathe. When I was not relaxed and taking life as it comes, I was not practicing that which would give me life:

breathing deeply.

Shallow breathing was keeping me alive, but it was not giving me any quality of life.

I was what I did not want to be:

stressed,

anxious,

overwhelmed.

My therapist was not alone in noting my breathing patterns.

My GI doctor told me that when the body is not breathing easily in deep sleep at night, my breathing was out of balance.

When adrenaline is pumped up,

one's body goes into 

fight or flight

response.

When one sleeps deeply and well, one's body is able to 

rest and digest.

These two bodily responses to life need to be in balance for good GI health.

Breath gives life.

Just breathe.

Take the time to breathe deeply and live the moment you are in more fully. Slowing down, pacing yourself, and being in the moment may actually give you more clarity about what you are doing and why you are doing it as you move through this holiday season.

Jesus came to give us life.

Let’s not let this season when we celebrate His coming

suck the life out of us.

Just breathe.

Did you know that the second to last verse of the last psalm in the Bible speaks about breath?

Let everything that has breath, praise the Lord.

Psalm 150:6

Just breathe,

and while you are at it,

Praise the Lord!

Triple A to The Rescue ~Who Do you Call When You need Help?

Triple A to The Rescue

I walked out the door on time today. That is always a challenge for me.

I was still late to my meeting.

The car wouldn’t start!

A dead battery was suspected, so my husband drove me to my destination.

Then, when I got home I made a call to old and trusted friend,

Triple A.

They saved the day again.

Thank goodness I could call you when I needed you.

I owe you a lot, Triple A.

How Triple A First Came into My Life

Back in late ’80s, I was a single mom living in Colorado Springs, Colorado.  One day, I had one of those mornings that began with a very bad start.  I had an early morning appointment at the hospital for an outpatient surgical procedure. When I got outside to leave, I discovered that my car had a flat tire.  A friend was scheduled to bring me home from the hospital, but that friend was at work and would not be able to help me with the flat tire.  I had no idea what to do.  I couldn’t change the tire. Everyone I knew was working. 

So, knowing full well there was absolutely nothing he could do about the situation, I called my dad.  He lived over three hundred miles away.  But, he was the one I called and cried into the phone, “Daddy, my tire is flat and I have to be at the hospital in half an hour.  I don’t know what to do.” 

Daddy knew just what to do.  He called Triple A, signed me up for a membership, and sent them out to the house to fix my tire.  He then paid my membership for the next year because he didn’t want me stranded with no one to help me.  It was good to have someone to call when I had trouble with that old car of mine. 

Triple A to The Rescue Again

In 1991, I was shocked one day when I received a telephone call at work from my old high school sweetheart.  He said he had recently gone through a divorce and wondered if I’d like to go to lunch.  It had been thirty years since we had dated, but he had always held a special place in my heart because he was such a dear, kind, and giving friend and sweetheart. In the thirty years since we had dated, we both had married others, but through friends, we always knew something of each other’s lives.  

Back in 1991, I had been single for ten years and had finally become quite independent, but I also still drove a very old Ford Fairmont, so I always kept up my trusty Triple A membership. 

Jim, newly divorced, driving the old car that he was left with after his divorce, drove forty miles from Pueblo, Colorado, to Colorado Springs, Colorado, to take me, his old love from back in the early 60’s, to lunch.  I guess he was pretty nervous about the trip, and about taking me out again after all those years, so he drove up the highway with his lights on even though it was was broad daylight.  

At noon, Jim picked me up at my house and off we went for lunch at the Olive Garden.  We had a delightful time at lunch catching up on the past thirty years.  He hadn’t changed a bit.  He was still that kind, loving, giving, successful, funny, and charming person I had adored as a teenager.

After a long lunch, we headed out to his car so he could take me back home.  That is when he discovered the battery to his car was dead.  He’d neglected to turn off his car lights and they had remained on during our long lunch.  The poor guy looked like he was going to die when he realized his car battery was totally dead on his first date with a woman he hadn’t seen for thirty years. 

“No problem,” I said.  “I have Triple A.”  We’ll just go over to the mall and find a phone and call them to come and help.”  (Those were the days before cell phones!)  So, that’s what we did.  Soon, Triple A came to the rescue. 

Later, Jim, with that twinkle in his eye, would always tell everyone that on that day he decided for sure he was going to marry me.  “She had Triple A.  I thought that would be a good thing to have.”  

Thanks Triple A for always coming to the rescue, and for landing me a man! 

The photo: Jim and Sally, 1992

To Whom Do You Call When You Need A Friend?

As I reminisced about how the courtship between my husband and myself began with Triple A, I also started thinking of my dear daddy and how he was always there for me for so many years when I needed him. 

My father and I in 1945

I then thought about the time seventeen years ago, when I got the call that he needed me.  In 2001 and 2002 for about six months, from June or July until the next March, my father had really gone down hill physically once shingles attacked his aging body the summer before his death.  I had gone over earlier that summer and that was when I had to have

that

talk with him. 

You know the talk that takes place between adult children and their parents when suddenly one feels like the parent instead of the child.  Daddy was in so much pain from the shingles.  He had diabetes, and he wouldn’t eat.  He was miserable. My poor mother was getting nowhere with him.  He was stubborn, and he was not being cooperative.  Finally, I told him I was taking him to the hospital if he didn’t eat.   He must have believed me because he started drinking his Ensure.  He knew I was as stubborn as he was.  I’d learned that trait from the best of them.  He knew I’d take him to the hospital if I felt it was necessary, and he didn’t want to go.  

When my husband and I went over for Christmas later that year, I was shocked at how frail he had become since my last visit that had occurred just before school had started that fall. When we left for home at Christmas, I told my dear daddy “I’ll try to be back over during Spring Break.”

In March of 2002, my mother called on a Thursday and asked, “Are you on Spring Break?”  “No, Mother, not until next week.”  “She said, “The doctor just put your father in the hospital and he’s asking for you.  He wants you to come.  You’re the one he’s asking for.”

Needless to say, as soon as I could wrap up the finals I was grading, I made my way to his bedside which was six hours away.  He passed away on the next Monday, which happened to be the first day of Spring Break.  I’ve always believed that my father hung on as his life was slipping away so that I wouldn’t have to take off from work to be at his bedside. 

He was like that. He had a heart that looked out for others. He was one of the most giving persons I ever knew.  I always knew I could count on my father.  He could be generous to a fault when he saw a need.  I remember as he was dying in the hospital that he heard one of the nurses telling how she had cancer and was working because she needed the insurance.  We thought my father was asleep while the nurse talked to us about hospice.  When she left the room, my father spoke to my mother, “Mother, make sure you find out that nurse’s name and write her a check.” 

I think the self confidence that others have always said I have comes from my father’s influence in my life.  He taught me so much about life.  I think it was his love and knowing he would be there for me and that he was very proud of me that caused me to have the confidence to accomplish whatever goals I have reached in my life.  He was always my best champion.

The above photo of my father, my mother, and I was taken in 1987 when I was awarded my first college degree, a BS in Business Administration. Later I would earn a BA in English and a MA in Teaching English as a Second Language. My father was always my best champion and the one who always inspired me to reach the goals I had for myself.

***************

Whenever I call Triple A for any reason, I think of my father and his gift of calling Triple A to help me when I needed a tire changed on a day that was already stressed filled, and on a day when I couldn’t find anyone to help me change a tire. Beyond making that call, my father then paid a membership for a continued source of help for one year when I never would have had the money to pay the membership myself.

**************

I think one the most important gifts my father ever gave me was a belief in myself when it came to solving life’s problems and dealing with hard things along the way. It was from him that I learned to “keep my head together” while I went into “problem solving mode.” He always told me, “you have a good head on your shoulders.”

He was that one that I knew would be there for me no matter what. In that helping, thankfully, he wasn’t one to rescue me.  He didn’t open up his checkbook and help me out of tight spots.  He was a generous man, but also was a wise man that knew I would figure out how to make it on my own and would be stronger and better for it.  His belief in me was the impetus that gave me confidence throughout the entire time he was on this earth.  His belief in me is still carried in that special place in my heart that is reserved for a daughter's love for her daddy.  I knew he was proud of me, and that he knew he meant the world to me. 

I think he would be one of my best blog readers.  He loved to write.  He loved a good story.  He was a great storyteller.  I learned to love reading and writing from him.  I wish I had told him more often how much he meant to me.

After my father’s death, my mother gave me all the cards and letters I’d sent him over the years.  He’d kept them all.  He even had saved my elementary school report cards. He showed me just by saving all those things how much he loved me.

One other thing about my dad, he taught me to be tough when I needed to be.  He taught me to stand up for myself.

He knew life would not be fair. He’d seen me through a great betrayal, and I think he knew I would have more great betrayals in my life. I think of him when I think of these words from a song called: You’ve Got A Friend,

People can be so cold,

They’ll hurt and desert you.  Well they’ll take your soul if you let them,

Yeah, but don’t you let them.

He always encouraged me to be my own person and to think for myself.  He challenged me to be thinker and not a follower.  He taught me not to let others treat me with disrespect.

He also taught me about grace because I saw him live it out in the declining years of his life.

My dad has been gone for many years now, but just by pulling out my Triple A card today when the car wouldn’t start, I am reminded again of the many of the gifts he gave me.

************

And, now, thanks to me making that call to Triple A on that first date the second time around with my husband, I have another of the dearest men to call. 

Jim, my dear high school sweetheart from long ago, has always shown me a special kind of love.  This poor man gets so many calls from me.  Whenever, I need him, I call.  He is always there.  Always.  My once strong self-confidence was rocked to the core after the death of my daughter nearly a decade ago.  Suffering from PTSD that is common to survivors of suicide, I have sometimes been racked by anxiety.  Only my husband knows how much I suffer, and only my husband can calm me down when I need calming down the most. 

He is the one I call out to in the middle of the night, or when I am driving down the road, or sitting next to in the living room.  He is the one I call when I need him to talk me through my times of anxiety and stress.  He is the calm, kind, voice of reason. No one knows how many times he has sat with me in the middle of the night when I have had an anxiety attack or when my heart has gone into wild arrhythmia and is racing at 150 beats a minutes and won’t slow down. 

Thankfully, in the years since my daughter’s death, anxiety has nearly completely disappeared in my life, only to be replaced by new concerns that we both have to address. Still, Jim is always there when I call day or night. 

I don’t know what I would do without his kindness, his wisdom, his support, his love.  I don’t know what I’d do if he weren’t there for me.  He is the friend that knows me better than anyone knows me.  He is the one that is straight with me in a firm and loving way.  He is the one to whom I call, and he has never let me down.  Thank you Jim for being there.  I love you. 

And, thank you Daddy, for being there for me too, and for getting me that first Triple A card.

To whom do you call when you need a friend?  

A Mother’s Heart on World Suicide Prevention Day

My daughter, Julie Ann Christiansen, died by suicide in the thirty-fourth year of her life on May 29, 2010. Just eight weeks before her death, I took this photo, the last I ever took of her, as she posed with her dog Phoenix

Yesterday, was World Suicide Prevention Day, but quite honestly, the significance of that day was far from my mind. While I always commemorate the day with other survivors of suicide by lighting a candle at 8:00 p.m. in memory of my daughter, I completely forgot to do so this year because I was in the midst of celebrating life with two of my living children, their partners, and two of my grandchildren.

So much has changed since Julie’s death nearly ten years ago. The family has seen divorce, remarriage, and the birth of a new family member. Jim and I have moved to a new city. In so many ways, our lives don’t outwardly look anything like they did a decade ago. Yesterday seemed to provide a microcosm of those changes.

Daughter Amy and I had gone shopping for a wedding dress earlier in the day. Julie would be so happy to know Amy’s new love. She’d be so happy to have her brother and sister-in-law back home from the far flung places where they have lived from Bangladesh to Boston. She’d be thrilled to know her new nephew Leon was born eight years after her death during the month she too had been born.

This photo of last night’s family gathering, is in many ways an encapsulation of all the changes in our family and would have caused Julie if she had been seen the photo to ask, “Who are these new people in the picture?” The reply would be, “That’s Jewett, Amy’s new love, and that’s Leon, Jon and Sam’s new son. That dog is Luna, Amy and Jewett’s wonderful Labrador retriever who does not have the vicious tail wagging capabilities that your dog Phoenix had.”

Last night’s gathering was an evening filled with much laughter, and sharing of stories that the kids say I never remember how they really happened. I marveled at the wonder of it all. I marveled over the happiness that I see in Amy and I am grateful that Jewett is in her life and in our lives too. I love having Jon and Sam “home.” I love hearing of Atticus’ high school life where as a junior he is taking mostly AP classes and has joined debate. I marvel at having a toddler in our midst. Leon is speaking in full sentence now and exerting control over his world as he attempts to tell us where our assigned seats will be, and shows us that his personality will indeed be strong, and interesting.

The practical side of such a gathering wore me down and made me aware that I am aging. There was the shopping for food, the preparing of it, of which I did little as I opted for burgers on the grill, store bought potato salad, chips, and Amy made dessert. Even the coordinating of getting food, dishes, and drinks on the table takes more than I seem to have these days when it comes to a crowd in my kitchen that includes dogs, kids, and confusion in cramped quarters. But all of it was so wonderful. My children were with me and I am always most happy when they are with me.

After it all, I went to bed, and I dreamt of Julie. She came to visit me in my dreams. Maybe subconsciously she had been deeply missed as the others gathered and I hadn’t been in touch with missing her, but I awoke this morning with a lingering sadness and a deep sorrow despite my joyful heart of having family with me.

In my dream, Julie came to visit me in a place I didn’t think she would know about, but she found me. Suddenly, she was there in our midst as if she belonged there, and indeed, she did belong, but she surprised me by appearing and in my dream I told her I didn’t think it was possible that she could, would, or should be there. But she was in our midst, and she assured me that it was her desire to see me that brought her there. We even danced together, and then I awoke and she was gone, but the memory of being with her remained.

And so today, I have been sad and the cavity in my heart that the loss of her has created has made itself known and felt. When my heart is full, so very full, and happy and grateful, there is still always a place that remains vacant.

I think this vacancy awareness comes from a chamber in my heart where Julie once lived. This chamber is the place that opened up and welcomed her on the day of her birth on April 8, 1976. It opened up and she moved in when I first held her in my arms and her eyes locked eyes with mine and she gave me her very first Julie look.

A mother’s heart keeps those chambers where each child lives soft and tender, loving, open, accepting. Those chambers are full of grace and unconditional love for each child living in the mother’s heart.

Can such a soft tender, well tended after part of a heart break? One wouldn’t think so. One doesn’t think of a fleshy part of a body being a place that can be shattered like glass. And so, as far as metaphors go, I don’t think we can picture a heart breaking like glass, but I know from experience that heart break feels like a shattering. I also know that a ripping took place when the life that lived in that chamber of my heart was snatched from that sacred place where I had carried my child, my beautiful daughter, for thirty-four years.

A mother never imagines that her heart can relinquish the treasure she has held so closely, so protectively, so lovingly, so deeply, for so long, In truth, the mind and the heart of a mother never do relinquish the child held in the mother’s most sacred place, her heart.

Perhaps, I continue to hold that place in my heart open. Only Julie was meant to live there and only she could ever fill it. When Julie left me on her own accord in a way I will never understand, I am only able to accept her leaving by trying to understand that she must have been so consumed by pain that her felt need to flee outweighed her ability to have hope for her future.

I know she never meant to break my heart. That was not her intention. She would have hated how she hurt her family. She would have hated how she shattered me. My own heart, while shattered and broken and confused and unable to comprehend her death, was somehow, by the grace of God, able to forgive her and to grieve for her pain and hopelessness. My heart has been able to accept her death and know that she is now at peace.

And so, while the cavity in my heart still aches, and while it is filled with a longing to be with my child so I could again gaze into her beautiful blue eyes while running one hand through her gloriously thick curly hair while the other hand intertwines my short fingers with her lovely long fingers, the cavity in my heart has been healed even as it aches.

The heart of a mother, my mother’s heart, has had an amazing capacity to accept the unacceptable. Accepting the unacceptable has taken many tears and many days and nights and much sorrow, but the capacity of the heart to keep on loving also allows it to keep on living.

My heart was not quashed by the loss of Julie even when I was sure it would be. I think if such a quashing would have happened, it would have annulled the sacred memory of her life. The hopeful parts of my mother’s heart remained. I had four other chambers in my heart where my other children lived and these chambers were still vibrant, alive, and very much in need of care.

It is a miracle that in this past decade that while my heart is still broken, it has been healed. In the Christian life we learn of how the opposite result from what one would expect to happen happens when one seeks to walk and live by faith. The Prayer of St. Francis teaches us these truths when it speaks of learning that is by giving that we receive, and by pardoning that we are pardoned. The broken parts of the heart, while still feeling bereavement over of the loss of the one who once filled the heart with the joy of her presence, are now filled with a deep and abiding peace that transcends my ability to understand or explain. Today, I read words by Frederick Buechner which came close to describing that which now resides in the chamber where the memory of Julie now lives. That chamber now also is filled with shalom which Buechner says means wholeness, or a fullness of having everything you need to be wholly and happily yourself. He goes on to say that “for Jesus, peace seems not to have meant the absence of struggle, but the presence of love.”

When this cavity was created in my heart, when an emptiness that seemed it would never be filled occurred when Julie left this life, a new peace moved in supernaturally when I first learned of her death. This peace has grown over time. Her physical absence left the love that created the space for her behind. Shalom also began to inhabit that space where the love of her remained, and both love and shalom began and continue to heal the broken parts of my heart.

Love, memories, and shalom will remain in this place of my heart until I am taken home, until I see her again.

Love created this space for Julie in my heart.

Love remains.

Love never dies.