Just a few days before 7 years since you died.

Miss you.

Sept 2014 Loved seeing your uncle Mark visit your memorial, but made me miss being there to.

Happy birthday 2014

Hi there beautiful girl.  I remember when you would say,"I wish I was pretty"...you just didn't think you were. I always thought you were beautiful.  But when I would say that, you would say, you have to say that....you're my mom....

You are right.  I was your mom, but really...I did think you were beautiful, and smart...and quite a girl.  You were strong-willed, independent and a clear and fierce thinker.  I liked that about you-you knew your mind.  You loved people, you  believed in things-and you weren't afraid to say what you thought.  I just always wanted you to allow people to have their own say, their own opinions...and that was something you worked on and did well with it!

You would have been 36 tomorrow.

I often think about what you would be doing...and then I just have to slow that train...not too good to go down that road too far.

I have learned to wrap my arms around what life you had...and the years you lived.  To embrace the fullness of that and remember as well as I can what you did and lived in those years.

I am encouraged to live more and as full as I can while I am still here.  Even today-a woman who knows your story, sought me out, to tell me the impact you had on her life...even without meeting you.  With tears in her eyes, she felt it impacted her in deep ways--all of it.  She affirmed to me how this all has changed me.  I have been changed.  I am deeply blessed to have had you.

All that said, deep in my heart, I sure miss you.  Rick misses you--he loves the stories he hears about you-he grieves you so...misses not really knowing you...just through the stories...and one short brief encounter before we left on the trip...

I can't wait till he gets to really meet you in heaven...and to see you two hug and know one another. You would just love him...he is the best.  You would have loved all this...that makes me so sad, to think of us missing this....but another road to not travel too far down...

So, sweet, sweet girl...I say "Happy birthday...I was just about to go into labor 36 years ago right now...I loved telling you that story over and over...all about how you were born...you just loved listening...and I loved telling...and you would never let me leave out even the smallest detail.

You were like that.  hahahahahhahaha....what a joy you were.


love you girl.  Miss you....

finding a place to walk

in life, i don't always know where i am, where to walk, where to move forward.

much has changed in my life.

a life role i had is mom.

i am not a mom anymore.

it just is what it is.

i was for almost 29 years.   good years, loved them.

i live in a new land now.  

i am not always sure where that land it and who i am in the land.

i somehow realized it today...like never before.

I was Sarah's mom.  Sarah is gone.  Gone with her is that role, that great place i loved so well.

no matter what, that is over.

seems like it has taken me a long time to realize that in the deepest place.

so, now...

how to live, how to walk...

where I am invited.  where it builds from relationship.

whew....

Time goes slow when you wait for someone to leave

We have been vigiling for 11 days now at Hospice House. We talk to others who have been here longer. Amazing how tiring it is. Sitting, waiting, watching for signs...wondering.
My sweet brother looks so tired... I've have run out of things to say, everyone has run out of things to say.
What a time, a time of itchiness....restlessness.
Laurie is quiet now, she is still. Hadn't eaten a thing for weeks. Has no kidneys so nothing out. How in the world does she keep on?
They veil feels thin, I have a sense of wonder. By midday we are all more testy with one another. Everyone is near and trying to walk together.

So, God, help us. Help us walk this very well, a witness to each other and to others.

Visioning

I have never been witness to such extravagant visioning. My sister in law, Laurie, is seeing things that being the biggest smile to her face. She sleeps most if the time and then, all is a sudden wakes abruptly, and throws her hand up in the air and looks wide-eyed and smiles and looks all around...WOW!!!!!!

What does she see, what wonders are before her...I just watch, knowing it is so sacred of a time. My heart aches to go, yet also to stay...

New land is in site

We meet with the people for Hospice House transition this morning at 9.  We are now waiting for a bed...means someone has to die that is in one of there beds, so you, Laurie, can be transported to that bed for your remaining days here.

Funny, if it can be funny...that there would be a vacancy sign lit telling these special end of life travelers...We have a bed for you.

Saw a large group at icu Wii just lost their young daughter,/friend to a drug overdose walk out her last moments these last days..seeing them help her give 6 parts of her body as an organ donor to others before leaving earth.

This journey if my own loss of Sarah has changed me so much as I walk slowly along...my senses are heightened...listening, watching with my soul's eyes....

My sister Marty said she keeps hearing in her heart, Sarah telling her..."I''ll take it from here".  So Sarah, are you near too...ah...someday, I will know too.

So today we will begin the turn...the turn to home for you Laurie...Bless these tender moments.

Walking near the borderlands

So, it is another time in my life to be so near the border of heaven, handing off my sister in law alongside her husband and daughter and our family, to the beginning of the next land.
Sacred ground. Walking around in the ICU and watching the faces of all the families....seeing the flurry of activity and yet....seeing the unseen...soft shapes of angels all around. Can hear the footsteps....

Such a tender and real time again.  I feel in my heart I live with a consciousness of heaven so very close all the time.  It is like the voices and noises of this heaven is so very near, and at times like now, so so near.

I watch this place of wrestling and restlessness in you Laurie--and feel you are seeing and knowing this transitional place and see your eyes not seeing just here any more.  Your body is failing right before our eyes. It is worn.  It is done with this fight.  10 years ago when I was starting this blog, I was watching my mom begin this transition.  Watching her begin to lay down her failing body and life here.  Now we watch you.

Our voices no longer seem to have any sound that reaches you...

I remember seeing my sweet Sarah's body after she had already laid it down was such a deep soul teaching to me, it was empty, hollow...no longer needed.  Like a discarded glove....crumpled, left.  Knowing in my soul there was more and you had gone on to that.  

Now I am watching again, a ringside seat...watching you breathe difficult and painful breaths.  Watching you struggle so at something I am sitting her and doing without even thinking.  Breathe in, breathe out.  over and over...no thought. Yet, now your breaths are numbered, they are becoming less...you are beginning to run out.  Run out of heartbeats, all the things keeping your broken body going. 

What a journey you have had all these years...so sick, so many different times, so many different diseases.  Now, your remaining donated kidney gone, dialysis machines trying to keep up with the junk in you needing to get out.   Infections all over, relentless...can't get one thing in place before more is destroying.

My dear brother, your sweet and precious husband...your warrior and helper...watching a fight he can't affect anymore...helpless, faithful, looking into the moments ahead when you will not be present...and how will he ever do it, what and how and all those questions we hate...that will be when they will be...their daughter, Bethany....help her to release her mom she has watched in such a hard life for so long...bring comfort to her...help her....

God, I know you are so very near...can feel your holy spirit in this midst.  I can sense the holiness of this transition. this birthing...this wrestling off of old for new.  please be near this dear sister of mine.  hold and help her...bring your light into this and comfort and meet her.  Help her wrestle out of this old and go to this place I long to see.  To be with you, to live in this land of no pain, no sorrow, no tears...near you.  seeing the fullness of what my heart longs so to see and know.  This world gets sore and long....

I hope in you, my Father.  This part is hard.  All other things going on all around seem to have the volume turned off or muffled as we walk in this most sacred land.  Hold us all, help us all.  

This is the picture I found of Laurie, such a sweet one--so full of her true joy--the joy that kept my brother laughing and so in love with her...thank you Father for all their years--even the hard ones-as they love one another well...with a deep love that has been witnessed by all who have cared for her and both of them all these past years.  What an example of laying your life down for one another.  Such tender love, truly a blessing.  

It is late.  I haven't written late when I can't sleep for some time.  I am so tired, yet sensing the most sacred things happening...what a journey.

Just missing you.

Took a walk with Rick and Harry yesterday, crisp and windy out.  Rick took these pictures of your boat, the boat that was your dad's first...and remembered the day you decided it was time to steal it back...details to be left out here--after he died and it was left in these same woods...only it was in such disrepair...

You decided to steal it and enlisted the help of Christopher, his dad and me...and we did it...and the story got bigger as you found out you didn't have the title and had to make it honest by going to Beverly and admitting this whole deal.  We ended up buying that boat and then began the journey of moving it here and there till you and Chris would be able to begin to fix it up.

Well, you didn't live to do that...and the boat began another journey with Chris moving it again and again...till he decided to give it to Dillon...the dear son of the man your dad bought it from ( our dear neighbors who had bought our house from us when we split up)...and found out that story now tells us...Dillon was probably conceived on this boat...and then Dillon's dad died at 50, so then this boat now became his..and he started to fix it up-even sailed it a couple years ago...but life is now busy for him...and because he lives next door...it is now back in the same place we "stole" it from...

So, I look at it all the time and just ponder...is there something in this whole scenerio to gleen...hmmmm

Just makes me laugh a bit...a silly boat...loved by different ones..but no real deep truth finds me...

and I don't want to fix it or sail it...too big, too much money...

but, it brings me deep tenderness still, remembering you at 20, when your dad died and wanting this boat cuz it brought you close to your dear dad.  And he and you are both gone...and the boat remains...

And I ponder.  So much in the past to bring dear memories for all of this, of you, even of your dad.

life goes on.  No big revelations here.  No lesson to really glean from it.  Just trying to be present. Rick listens so well to these stories and somehow becomes closer to you--and loves you as a dad...

Wish I could have seen you get it fixed up and sailed it with you.  You had so many dreams that just stopped immediately.  Somedays, that just makes me plain sad.

I miss you Sarah.  I miss your fullness, your vest for life.  I live with a hope in the heaven and let that hope spill into today...

A kiss from Italy came to me this morning from Isabella...a woman who was walking in Manarola and was taking a photo of the sunset in Manarola from the place where Sarah's plaque is located and she turned and saw the plaque, Sarah's picture we left there over a year ago when we visited...and then googled Sarah/Ohio/Manarola and found her story...and my email....

As I woke this morning...here were her kind words and a virtual hug...from this land, my second home...

I am so touched, so blessed...a kiss from heaven today. 

I miss you sweet girl...

Don't often have words anymore to write here.  Just a deep quietness in my heart, holding you and each memory so very close as I continue to walk on in this life.  I wish somehow I could come sit here and listen to the water today..and be near where you took your last breath. 
But I live in this land, by this water you loved all your life.  I am a blessed mom...I live where you lived and loved too.  I will come to this land again...somehow I know...
Heaven seems near right now to me...I sense the veil thin, I feel your touch....I know.

Love you sweet girl. 

Remembering

Sweet November.
I remember how excited I was for your birth.
Your due date was the 5th, but you in your own strong ways, waited till the 19th. Your dad even kept taking me on river bed Jeep rides trying to induce labor.
It was a late Saturday night on the 18th that I started true labor. I made sure I took shower and shaved my legs in between the pains before waking your dad to go to the hospital.
I was so aware of this sacred event just beginning to unfold. We didn't know if you were a boy or girl....
When I woke after the c-section, I heard your dad saying over and over...it's a Sarah.....it's a Sarah....and I opened my eyes and saw you for the very first time.
What a joy beyond words.
I was told  I wouldn't be able to have children.
You were my miracle.
You would have been 35 this year.
So many things that might have been if you lived.
But, you did not.
I just miss you.
But am so very glad you lived...what a joy, unspeakable...sweet girl. I sure love you.

Hi there, sweet girl...I toast to you today.  My sweet girl.  I remember this last time we were here...just enjoying time.  We took time, we made time to make memories.  I am so glad we lived that way--not waiting till....

I have so many memories today of you and your "Sarah" way of living--how totally wild and well you lived.  Burning the candle at not only both ends, but somehow in the middle too.  I didn't know how short your life would be and sometimes would tell you to slow down, take it easy and you would just laugh at me...and keep on living the way you did.  Now it makes  sense to me.  I am glad you didn't listen to me but to your own internal compass.

It is hard to believe 6 years have passed.

How in the world did I keep walking this out? 

How did Chris keep walking?  The friends and family...how?

I know that God is so good to us...present in our agony, our sorrow, to help us.  To help me....

Just having such a hope to see you in the next life, the one that doesn't end.  The one my heart sings for.
Today is somehow better for me, to get to the anniversary finally after weeks of remembering and agonizing all over again the terrible tragedy and all the events that shook our world.

I celebrate today-your sweet and tender life...you.

I love you sweet Sarah C. 

I miss you so...

Night before 6 years

So, here I am sitting here, listening to Jonathan Livingston Seagull...in my studio...alone right now...candles lit, glass of merlot.

Gosh, I just miss you so. Life has been so odd with you gone. How did 6 years go by?
So much I want to tell you about. How I wish you could have met Rick and seen our life....how happy you would be.
So much missed...

You are missed.

I remember so much sweet Sarah C.

moms remember so much. Part if our job. At least it always was my job...you always wanted a story. Always saying...tell me about.......

Wish I could tell you another sorry.

Listening to Be....I remember the time we watched this movie...and both of us said whoever dies first would play it at their funeral....so you got it. And how similar the movie is to even how you died. Who would have ever known...oh my, sweet girl. Sweet, sweet girl...

Almost 6 years.
God, how does one walk this whole journey out?

Some days, it just seems like I see you, some girl with long hair turns her head just like you did and flips up her hair and for a second I see you.

Then a laugh in the distance has a sound like yours and I turn my head...and it hits me all over again...

Some days it is just too much to keep on living.  But I do.

It can wreck your mind to imagine it all over again, so don't go there too long, yet I do.

just missing you.

Missing being in Manarola, wanting to sit quietly...watch the waves...

Words don't come as often now, yet they swirl all the time in my heart...waiting to come out.  So here are some, to lay on this page, for me to see in print.

Most days are not too bad, yet some days just are...

Today is one, near the time of this 6th anniversary.  Full moons, smells of decay in the air.  Crickets chirping...memories calling.

You were the absolute best.  My dearest friend.  My sweet Sarah C.

sweet kisses

sometimes i just feel you close, looking over...touching different ones of us still here on this side...close.

love this picture.

missing you.

sweet mother's day 2013

 Another mother's day.  this is the 6th since you died.  I have sweet memories of the past mother's days.  I remember the one when you were little and my sister Marty and her daughter Kimmy were visiting us down in Newark.  Marty and I were sound asleep in my room and all of a sudden the bedroom door burst open and in you and Kimmy came--think you were around 12ish?  Kimmy was little...and on the stereo in the living room was blasting the 1812 overture...LOUD!!! and in you both came carrying a tray that had a kitchen towel on it, with a rose in a vase from our garden and a bowl of cement cereal or was it soup with crackers--anyways, it was cement...and you also made us a rolled up peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  I think there was chocolate milk too....
You guys came over to us--said, "Sit up!" You each threw another towel across our chest and set the tray on our lap and said, "Happy Mother's Day!" and left the room....oh yeah, you took a picture of us that Marty has a copy of--it is bad...wow.  We just looked at each other after you left the room and laughed right out loud!  What kids!!

Here I am now, and you are gone to heaven now for 5 1/2 years.  I have learned so much in this time.  I have met so many other moms who too, have lost a child or sometimes more than one.  I have entered a group of the most precious people who have sent their most precious ahead to heaven and continue to stand up each day and keep walking forward.  Some of us  have other children, but the one we sent is not to ever be replaced...each was unique and precious to us.

Some have lost children in the most horrendous ways-by taking their own lives, or being killed by someone or in a car accident or a rogue wave...or death from a dreaded disease way too young, or even in midlife.  I got an email today from a dear woman who is 85 who lost her dear daughter to cancer at 55.  She still grieves deeply.  Each of us has had to take that first step into this never known land of loss of our dear one.

I have learned so much from each of you--and the ones who don't read this blog.  I feel your presence on most every day, a silent holding of hands as we continue one.  Sometimes when I think I can't take another step, someone corresponds, or writes something to touch and encourage.

I miss you sweet Sarah.  I thought by now, you would have children of your own and I would be learning how to do grandmothering...not so.  I have been given the gift of older grandchildren and children when marrying Rick-the most precious gift given to me-other than you--in my life.  He came along as a gift from God just 54 days after you died and I believe somehow you influenced God to send him to me.  Don't know how that happens, but he is so precious.  From him being in my life, I now have the privilege to walk alongside my new kids and grandkids and learn more about loving than I have ever known.  You would have loved having them in your life.  I wish you could have experienced this with me.  

There isn't a day I don't think about you-where you are, what you are doing...what a challenge to my belief system.  I ponder heaven and what is next.  I no longer am afraid of death at all.  The transition to the next is ahead and I don't know how long I have here, but want to make the most of the moments.  

I sit here with a glass of Merlot, my choice of helping the pain of loss...all these years.  It is a sweet taste of grief.  The crushing of grapes along with the fermentation to make this sweet beverage.  I even ponder that you and Christopher were married at a vineyard.  I can still see you in your wedding dress walking though the vineyards--and ponder even that.  Seems like I sense you near when I toast to your life.  You are my dearest.  I miss you more than words can ever say.  

I celebrate the blessed gift of being called to be your mom today-a gift many never get to even do.  I am thankful today, not crushed.  I celebrate all the women today who also have lost and lift a toast to you my fellow companions of this journey.  I sense your closeness in spirit today.  

I also celebrate my dear mom--somehow I know you and Sarah are hugging each other today--with the other women in our families who have gone first.  Such a mystery...such a mystery.

just a woman grateful today.

 

Life goes on.
Somedays there are moments I am so disjointed in being present.  I feel caught between a place that includes you and the other place where you are not here.
Easter was a dear and precious time for us.  Somehow it was a time of such hope--resurrection, "He is risen" were words often spoken.  It is truly still my hope.  So many family have gone on now, including you.

I want to keep on.

This post isn't making much sense.  I should write more often.  My fingers are stiff with words not written.

Ache in my throat...holding back the tears.  No words to say that will make the ache go away.  No great ending paragraph that will tie it all up and make it clear.

This loss is a lifelong loss...a loss for each day, every day till I die.  I miss you.  I may live well, laugh and enjoy, but there is always an ache.  Memories of you make me smile and remember the dear things...but they don't take away the ache.

It is a road that never gets better...at least I don't think it will this side of heaven.  Just missing you.  sweet, sweet girl....

Home again...the journey continues

 Pictures from the time away.  This is a picture of me, my sister Marty and my Aunt Barb with the wonderful couple who rented the room to Sarah and Christopher when they stayed in La Spezia while going to the Cinque Terre.  They took such good care of Christopher and us after Sarah died.  We stopped to see them for a short visit on our way to Riomaggiore.  They speak little English, so our visit was sharing some pictures and lots and lots of hugs and tears....love them so.

 Little did we know as we were traveling to Cinque Terre that a landslide had happened on the walk of Love-between Manarola and Riomaggiore, just a few days before we came.  That meant the entire walk between the 5 cities was closed and still is now.  We heard that 4 Australian women (in their 60s) were injured and we think that one died afterwards.  This we found out and saw in the newspaper as we stopped to see the couple above.  At this point, we didn't even know if we would be able to go to Sarah's memorial if the walk was closed.  I know each of us was deeply affected to hear this news and leave there to take the train to Riomaggiore.

 We came to Sarah's memorial plaque area shortly after getting settled.  The walkway was closed right after where her plaque is at Pont Bonfiglio.  There were many people trying to understand what was happening as different signs were posted.  There were many people who had traveled to this land to be able to walk the trails and were having to take trains instead from city to city.  This meant there were alot of people on the trains and even walking around at the place where her memorial was.  We talked and shared with many people about Sarah while we visited each day.  We placed a picture of her last picture on the jar below so people would know what Sarah looked like.  It was a tender moment watching my husband-touch this plaque.  He only met Sarah and Christopher briefly before we left on the first trip.  We were just friends through the Area Vineyard Pastor's association at that time.  He had such tenderness in his heart as he touched the plaque of the "daughter he never got to know". 

 On Sept. 27th-the 5th anniversary of Sarah's death, we brought flowers to put at her memorial.  Our dear friend Paula had gone into the city to buy flowers for her and also her husband's cousin-whose place we rented, put together a beautiful bouquet of flowers that I am carrying from her own garden for us to put in the vase.

 Here is the plaque area with the flowers we brought as well as the glass jar of rocks, sand, feathers and beach treasures I brought and placed behind the jar from Sarah's beach here in Ohio.

 This is at the train station as we got off to go to Sarah's memorial.

 This is a picture of the memorial site where her plaque is located.  It is right between the 2 tall palm trees.

 We were blessed to spend a few hours with Franco, who was the president of the Cinque Terre at his home.  This was the most treasured time to hear his heart about almost losing his own life before a liver transplant and also to hear about the landslide in Vernassa and thinking he lost one of his sons.  He also spoke with deep love to us for knowing each of us after Sarah's death.  He is the one who wrote the poem on her plaque and had the ceremony when we went back in 2008.

 Right across from Sarah's plaque is a large compass on the ground with North pointing directly at Sarah's plaque.  This touches me deeper than words can say-for those of you who know me through my name truenorth78 and the Compelled to True North ministry.  Seeing this for the first time when we went in 2008 touched me so very deeply-more than any words can say.

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 It rained at different times--this is looking up to where her plaque is and where the compass is on the ground.

 These are our 2 dear, dear friends--Paula and Mauro.  She has helped in the most dear ways since meeting her in 2008.  She is my hands in carrying flowers to Sarah's site and checking it for me.  She takes my mother's love there as often as she can.  What a gift to a mom who lives on the other side of the ocean....

So, here I am....a few weeks after getting back.  The return home had me getting sick with Bronchitis, my aunt sick and my little sister getting sick again--almost lost her.  It was a difficult re-entry....We had a powerful trip.  We did finish the cruise we had to leave back in 2007 when Sarah died.  I am still mostly at a loss for words.

I know that it stirred up more than I realized it would and emotions that have been more than difficult to process and understand.  It was like being tramatized all over again, so in some ways, I was caught off guard.  I knew it would be difficult and did my best to prepare, but honestly....it is impossible to know what will be brought back to the surface.  It is hard to have this place of death so very far away...and then to go there and find that many people just still are remembering Sarah so often.  The priest who did the ceremony when we returned told me he has just remembered Sarah the day before in mass...as he knew it was the anniversary....that touched me so deeply.

I am better now that I am realizing and finding words now.  It is just the most awful thing that could happen and it happened in one of the most beautiful places with the most beautiful people...and it just is hard to make it digestable.  Grief is raw again...deep, searing...just awful....the images are fresh again...real again....

I am very glad to have gone---I now have the name of the man who risked his own life from the coastguard to contact to thank for holding her in the rough seas.  He knew if he didn't, we would have lost her body to the sea.  I have a friend I have met since Sarah's death whose son died from a rogue wave in Australia and they never found his body....I think of her as I write these words....

So, the journey now continues...I hope to go back again as it truly is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.  My sister and I were talking that it is like in Chronicles of Narnia to go there--it is like going through the wardrobe...and then coming back to this world I live in---so very different from there...it is like coming back out of the wardrobe.

I miss that land, that place....every day.  I have a hard time processing that....understanding that she just left life here so very quickly while in a place far, far away....

My mother's heart aches...for me, for Christopher, for her friends...for all of us who lost a treasure that day....

She is well remembered there...and honored by many.  I met tour directors from Germany who knew of the tragedy back in 2007, who tell the story to the groups they bring to this land.

I wish it was different....but it isn't.  That will take some time again to live with that.

Leaving soon...
Am always glad to get started after weeks of thinking about it.
I think I showered and packed the last things all night in my sleep...should make it maybe easier to sleep on the flight over.

My heart is tender, sore, aching...remembering...ugh...

5 years ago we left for a wonderful vacation and had such good plans to meet in Rome and Venice...and never did it happen.

Now to go back and to honor your death...to celebrate your life dear Sarah...

God, please help us all.

Hold us close.

Keep us.


going now.

a bottle of beach treasures to take to your spot, the area where the plaque is...to leave there in honor of you.  Glass and feathers and sand and even some of your ashes...lavender...treasures you loved and even the white stones you would gather and keep.  a red glass and cobalt...and other colors...small shells...bits of treasures...

simple...to represent our land in this land you took your last breath. 

mystery.