Memories of the Music Cafe

 

                                      Daniel and Mom, in about 2007, a year before his passing
 

 

                Some years ago, our rural county had a music cafe where people could sit, have lunch or dinner, a drink or a snack, and could watch performers on a small stage across the room.  In the back there were multiple rooms where the owner could give music lessons. The food was quite good and it was a great place to go especially of you didn't wish to drive too far on a Fall or Winter evening.  In this era, Stephanie and Adam were in college, but each week, usually when I took Matthew and Daniel to the library, in the evening we would stop off in the music cafe.

               The owner was a singer, songwriter, guitarist, and performer in his own right, and found that founding the music cafe was a way that he could earn a living doing what he loved, while still being at home at night with his wife and young children.  Eventually, the challenges of music lessons, running the restaurant and cafe, and scheduling the acts and weekly activities became overwhelming, and the founder sold his business to a trail of other restaurants, that never seemed to capture our interest the way the original one had.

               Today, almost fifteen years after Daniel's passing, and almost two after Matthew's passing, Nik and I made a rare stop at the county's Dunkin' Donuts.  It was a cold day, and we thought a couple of donuts and some warm drinks would hit the spot.   A man ahead of us was ordering something similar.  I recognized him almost immediately as the founder of the music cafe.  For some reason, he remembered me also.   I told him how much we missed the cafe, and asked him what he and his family were doing now.  He is still giving music lessons, mostly guitar.  He was shocked to hear that both Daniel and Matthew have now died.  He had missed hearing this about either of them. He looked sad when I told him.  I told him because the music cafe had been some of the very best memories I'd had with Daniel and Matthew.  Even when there wasn't an act playing there, we could watch the wide screen television with country music acts performing while having dinner.  It had been a regular weekly habit for us and we had thoroughly enjoyed it.

              Make sure you make as many memories with your children as possible whenever you can.

 

 

 

 

Somehow, I am Still Lucky

Dear Daniel,

           I don't get the chance to go out by myself as often as I used to. I am busy with your nephew, the horses, the dogs, the alpacas or something else at the farm most days.    This week, I got the chance to run and errand in Richmond, and it went fairly quickly, and so I had the time to make a couple of stops during the return trip.

           One of the stops I made was at an antique shop. There were a couple of things I knew they had that your sister would like, and so I bought them with a plan to put them away for her.  While I was there, I felt compelled to talk to the shop owner, a man who'd been there a long time.  I spoke about all of the kids, and the man actually had met your brother Adam and knew his work.   Then, I told him about you.  After nine years, I deal with the matter and your loss matter of factly when I relate the story. It's not that I don't feel it, and it's not that I am not, at times, sorrowful, but I have the faith I had the day of your departure, and I have the perspective that comes from nine years of contemplating that if God called you in such an unusual way, that he must have had purpose in an action that has touched so many other lives.  I told the man what had happened, and it brought him to tears.  I told him that it was alright, because God has you.  I thought you might like to know that people are shedding tears and missing you, and remembering their own losses from Earth, even nine and a half years after your departure.

            Most days I deal well with your being in Heaven while I complete my work with the rest of your family here on Earth.  Of course sometimes, I shed tears, or wonder what I could have done that God would see fit to call my youngest son home.  I don't think it's about me though. I think it's that you are so important, that you were needed at Home for some reason, and that I must accept this.
             My life has been so much richer as a result of your having been born to us, and have occupied the place of my youngest son.  I remember your presence on Earth as if it were yesterday. Sometimes, when I am deep in sleep, usually at four am, I feel you sitting with me. I am so proud of you, for so many reasons,
even now.

             I love you wider than the oceans and deeper than the seas,   always.

And the Bathroom Still Stands as Witness

              

Daniel

         In a few days, it will have been nine years since you entered the bathroom, collapsed, and died. My immediate  CPR, a precordial thump, a shot of epinephrine, and then another, followed by the sheriff's deputies use of the AED made no difference. You hit the floor, and you were gone.  In the crazy days and weeks which followed, there weren't many answers. Eventually, multiple world class pathologists at university medical centers said that although your autopsy was negative for anything that should have caused your death, that your collapse, your fall forward, and the number of sudden deaths in older members of our family coupled with our strong family history for arrhythmia (heart rhythm disturbance) is likely what took you, even at only age 12 1/2.  Since then, so many more children and teens have died suddenly from sudden arrhythmic death syndrome (SADS) and sudden unexplained death in childhood (SUDC), that although I am sure you have a lot of company and friends to talk to about it, it is of no consolation to their families, or to myself.

                I often think about the bathroom you died in.  The house was new when you died there. The shiny walls and lights, new marble tub and shower. The mirror and new shower curtain, and the photos of lighthouses are still there.  When you died, the baseboards and shoe moldings were new. Today, they are showing just a little age, the result of steam and occasional splashings by your siblings and your toddler nephew. A few days after you died, I lay on the floor, as you had, looking up to see if anything resembling a stairway to Heaven were there, something, anything, but there wasn't anything.  It was simply a bathroom. I couldn't imagine how your active and shining soul could have seeped out of the cheery new room.  How could something so cataclysmic have occurred in such a pleasant and ordinary room?  One of your doctors called it a "supernatural passing".  How could a supernatural passing have occurred in a modern bathroom. Wouldn't it have needed to occur in a church?

               Since then, we haven't changed  much in the bathroom.  There are some prints that are hung on the wall in blue and white which look quite good.  James uses the bathroom more than anyone, since he occupies your old room, after we moved all of your things to a new bedroom we finished in the basement. (To those who don't know us, James in a young teen who was adopted the year after Daniel died, something Daniel had always wanted us to do.) Also since that time, your nephew bathes in the tub in that bathroom, and spends more time in the tub there, than anyone else ever has, since all of you preferred showers.

              The bathroom remains the same, and on some levels so do I.   I still can't believe that my youngest son could celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends, play a soccer game with college students, and then arise the next day perfectly well, with the intention of Black Friday shopping.  We were getting ready to go, when you collapsed and died.   Black Friday is all it will ever be for me.

               

The Grey Metal Casket

          

This is it.

             One of the strangest things about having a child die suddenly is that all at once, there are many questions asked of you. Will you be wanting burial or cremation ? Where are the remains to be buried ? Where is the funeral to be held ? Do you want an open casket or a closed one ?  How much do you want to spend ?  Will you be needing embalming services ?  No one really cares that your child collapsed and died three hours ago, and no one knows why.

                 In the past I have thought of myself as someone whose mind works fairly quickly. As a critical care nurse I have functioned well and thought clearly in any number of pretty horrible emergencies both in and out of hospitals, but nothing can compare to the sudden absence of your child's spirit from his body, before your eyes. Nothing can compare to being told that since there was no "foul play" suspected that any autopsy would have to be at your own expense ***, and nothing can compare to being asked a number of fairly complex final questions when you have absolutely never considered such things where your child is concerned. We actually didn't know of a single funeral home in our area.

               Part of the reason I had difficulty answering such questions is that the questions and the answers were complex. Our farm actually has a family cemetery, and despite the frozen ground, we wondered if it could be used for Daniel's remains now. Secondly, how could someone have an open casket funeral after an autopsy ? Thirdly, why was embalming required by law ?   Somehow we navigated this very difficult time and item by item came up with answers to these mind bending questions. We chose to have the funeral in the county seat of the place in which Daniel and our other children had homeschooled. We thought that more of his friends could attend this way, rather than holding the funeral in Charlottesville, which had been my first leaning. We learned that despite the autopsy, that great care had been taken to allow an open casket funeral afterward. I did not want this, but my husband did, and who was I to argue ? He too had lost his youngest son that day. Also at that time, we chose cremation, just as my parents, grandparents, and aunts had.  And so, we needed to buy a casket, not for him to be buried in, because his remains wouldn't be, but simply for the hours of the viewing and the funeral itself.  Afterward, we could have given it back to the funeral home where it would be refurbished and presumably used again.  We selected a rather heavy metal casket painted a matte gray with shiny silver toned handles.  Inside it was lined with a particularly soft pillow and white soft lining which reminded me of the fabric of the gown and clothing Daniel wore for his christening. The funeral itself was quite beautiful and well attended. It truly was a celebration of Daniel's life with many people ranging in age from babyhood to in their eighties in attendance. Even a cat named Macintosh, that Daniel truly loved, that belonged to a friend, attended the gathering in a carrier.

                   All of the decisions we made we solid reasonable ones, perhaps except for one. Rather than giving the coffin back to the funeral home afterward, we decided, in advance, to keep it. There was a great deal of metal in it and we'd paid what we considered a great deal for it. Daniel was a big believer in recycling and repurposing almost everything, and perhaps this was a hats off to him.  Perhaps our eldest son, who was completing his degree in sculpture at university could use the metal and fashion an incredible sculpture of some kind. He certainly had with other heavy large metal items. The funeral home wanted it off their property as quickly as possible after the funeral.  The day after, we secured it to one of our trucks using multiple bungee cords and covered it with a tarpaulin. As we drove the distance to the farm, periodically the tarp would blow upwards in the wind, and drivers behind us would see that we were toting a coffin. Daniel would have thought this hysterical. I remember being an odd combination of distraught and amused as they passed our truck, looking strangely at us. Why shouldn't I want the casket? I thought. We didn't yet have Daniel's ashes back. I still wasn't sure that the happenings of that week weren't a terrible nightmare.  When we got home, we placed the coffin in one of our outbuildings on its back. I was surprised to see that the pillow and lining were still intact and clean and had not been removed.
              It didn't matter how much we said that Daniel's casket didn't really have anything to do with him and how repurposing it as a sculpture would have pleased him. Our eldest son, who had originally planned to use the metal in a project was struck by lightning while closing up another wooden building with a metal roof here in August of 2011. Although he survived, he had a number of ongoing medical problems which limited his use of the welders and equipment necessary to completely take down the casket to its component parts.
            And so, an empty gray casket sits alone and waits in an empty building here on our farm, and has now for eight years.  It remains as beautiful and as clean as the day in which I first saw it. It has taken eight years for me to be able to tell you this. Perhaps 2017 is also the year in which the casket is set free to become something else other than a symbol of a very sad day indeed.

















***The University of Virginia Medical Center eventually chose to make Daniel's case a teaching one, as no clear structural cause of his passing could ever be demonstrated. Since his cause of death was theoretical, we were never billed for multiple autopsies by different pathology teams. The cause of death was surmised to be a functional cause of death, a supposed heart rhythm disturbance in a heart that appeared healthy otherwise. We learned later that this flaw of heart rhythm does run in our family, and it had to be treated by ablation in other family members.

Eight Vast Years

           

       I found this picture of you taken when you were about eight at Christmas, at the first farm. I believe your sister says you were being dressed to be an elf.   I can't believe that it's eight years today since you had to depart. I love you just as much as I ever did, and the memories of what you liked and disliked when you were here are still fresh. You will always be my son whether you had continued life here on Earth, or in Heaven. Your siblings and your dad mention you often and we often giggle at things you said which have turned out to be quite true. Love to my Dad and everyone with you. I love you wider than the oceans, and deeper than the seas, and I always will.

Stop Crying: This is the Good Stuff

             

  Today, just two days before Daniel would have been gone eight years, one of my sons was married in a beautiful church ceremony with friends and family in attendance.  He has married a lovely young woman that Daniel clearly would have adored. Perhaps our entire family will benefit from a wedding anniversary that occurs just two days from Daniel's sudden departure from Earth.
            
              There were lots of tears at the lovely well attended wedding.  In fact, some of the bride's nieces and nephews asked me why so many of the adults were crying.  I told them that first, we were crying because seeing two people very much in love who finally are able to marry one another is both rare and sweet and makes us cry. Also, such beautiful music, which was especially chosen by the bride and groom makes many of us cry, all by itself.  Also, if we are the parents of the bride or the groom, we cannot help but remember them as small children and wonder how they made the jump from toddler to kindergartener to teen, college student, graduate, and then husband or wife. We wonder how the years could have passed so quickly when they might seem not to have for us.  Lastly, we cry because we are just a grain selfish. When our children marry the love of their lives, there simply will be a bit less time for us, and we cry because we may, just a bit selfishly,know that life will change and that we will miss them.  The kids seemed to accept this, or perhaps they simply were sorry they asked.

              In any case, I send understanding and good wishes to anyone who has had to sit through beautiful music and has been the mother of the bride or the groom.

Our Fragile Times

                

Daniel,  May, 1996-November 28, 2008

 

       This week, two ladies who worked with my daughter died on the same day.  Later in the week, the lady who took over work for one of our family members while he vacationed, passed in a car accident.  The end of this existence will come for each and every one of us, and yet, we work, play, and sometimes plan as if it will not.

    We are just five days away from the day when, eight years ago, my son Daniel, who was only 12, collapsed and died here at home. He had a clean autopsy, and so the prevailing pathologist's theory is that he experienced a sudden heart rhythm disturbance, as increasing numbers of children who play sports are doing, and that despite immediate CPR, his rhythm disturbance was non-recoverable. He's had a physical with a professor of pediatrics just a week or so before his death, and now ironically, both my son and that physician are dead.This time of year used to be my favorite, and yet, even eight years past Daniel's passing, I am fragile around Thanksgiving. It seems to me that almost everyone in our family eventually passes within October or November.

                    I am however, not quite as destroyed as you might expect because I know a few things which ease the journey.  Our trip to Earth is a temporary one for us all. Each one of us is issued a mortal flesh suit and then raised with the idea that our stay is somewhat open ended. After all, when we're in school we may be told that by the time we are middle aged, there will be a cure for all the cancers, and failing organs will be laboratory grown and transplanted. You'll live to 120 the school physician told me at 16 when I had a tennis physical.   Of course, none of this is true. Our bodies are on loan, a bit like a tuxedo rental from the Men's Warehouse. We work and play and over time, we age. The aging that is evident on the exterior indicates that similar or even more severe aging is occurring internally.  Entropy is real. We age in steps and eventually must evacuate our flesh suits even though we wish, at that point,  simply to shelter in place. It is universal. It will happen to us all.

                   I have actually accepted my own mortality pretty well over the years. The only reason I fear it now is that I have more skin in the game than I used to.  I still have four children remaining on Earth, and a grandchild. I dislike the idea of feeling as if I will ultimately be abandoning them all in a world that is not quite as friendly as most mothers wish it were.

                 Still, we come to Earth. We live, we love, we work, and this too is very important.  Eventually, we leave the rental suit and go home to a more permanent arrangement.

                  Make sure that tomorrow when you see family and friends that you drink the water and realize how cool and quenching it can be. Be kind, even to those who don't really deserve it, because this could be their last Thanksgiving.  Drink the sparkling cider and don't be tempted to drink anything that muddies your memory of this rare day. Realize that the little kids who will spill gravy on the oriental rug are going to remember tomorrow always. See that they remember you for forgiveness.  Remember always to place people above even valuable things.  Make sure that although you have a strong work ethic, that you are also known for the important ability to set work aside, even just for a day.   Eat and enjoy, but not so much that you make the rental suit sick, because you will have to inhabit it the day after, as well.

                   Enjoy this day as if it is your last, not because it will be, but because someday there will be a day that is.

                      Happy Thanksgiving

This Time of Year

           

      No matter how many times we revisit this time of year, as it approaches, I still have trepidation as if it's a train pulling into a dreaded station.  This year, it will be eight years since Daniel enjoyed Thanksgiving with friends and family and then, the day after, in preparation for Christmas shopping, collapsed and died in our home's main floor bathroom.  Even though we heard the crash of his falling, and unlocked the door with a key and started immediate CPR, there was no coming back. The helicopter team from the University of Virginia ran an exceptional code, but he was gone before they had really arrived.
               We live now in the altered, no fractured timeline doing the best we can to propel our children forward in a world frankly Daniel might not quite have recognized from eight years ago.
                 The song below, by Steven Curtis Chapman, is a comfort and I hope it will be to you as well.




https://www.facebook.com/stevencurtischapman/videos/10154374217952949/?video_source=pages_finch_trailer

An Alpaca on an Oriental Rug

Daniel with Cammie, in early August, 2004

                         Sometimes, I look back sadly on the twelve and a half short years Daniel had on Earth. Sometimes I feel as if I should have taken him to Europe, or to Canada or even Iceland.  The fact is, I believed all those things could wait or that he could do them as an adult. I believed he would be on Earth for an entire lifetime and that there was no reason to race through his life.  Other times I look back on his life and realize that in many ways he enjoyed an unusual and special life here, even though he may not have completed the things I might have wanted for him.

                         Daniel loved animals, and in late July of 2004, one of our alpacas, Queen Isabelle, gave birth to a third cria (baby alpaca)   Isabelle's milk did not come in as it should have, and the vet came to give the cria a blood transfusion from another animal in order to provide the immunity that the initial colostrum ordinarily would have provided. We also needed, for a time,  to tube feed the cria, and then nurse her through colic, all while running her outside periodically to maintain the bond she was to have with her mother.  At night the cria slept in some clean orchard grass in our empty deep jacuzzi in the master bedroom.  During the day, she spent time with her mother outside in the grass. The cria, named Warrior Princess Camellia, or Cammie to mere mortals like ourselves, came inside to the bathroom to receive orogastric tube feedings. At times, the little dear did walk over genuine oriental rugs ! Fortunately, even young crias urinate and defecate only in a dung pile out of doors.  Daniel was especially nurturing to little Cammie, who was all of twenty pounds during this period of time.

              Time passed quickly and Cammie grew.  As time passed she not only had the bond with her mother for which we had all hoped, but a bond with Daniel and the rest of her humans, as well.  Daniel may not have seen Europe or had pastries in Paris. He may not have have seen bubbling hot springs in Iceland, or have made it to Stonehenge in England, but he did live a remarkable life.  He spent a lot of time studying things with which he had a deep interest. He read a great deal and few had such a detailed understanding of a computer and the internet. In fact, he was looking at colleges at 12 1/2 and was academically ready to go. He enjoyed close relationships with animals and was an important caregiver to them, especially when they had difficulties. He enjoyed rescue dogs, and chickens and ducks. He did far more of the things he really cared about doing than many of us have the chance to do.

             We had no idea what was to come. Probably the reason that Cammie's mother did not produce milk following her delivery, is that she was later found to have an advancing brain tumor. The vet believed it to be astrocytoma.  Cammie's mother Isabelle died in the Summer of 2004. I remember Daniel hosing Isabelle down to keep her cool following a seizure in one of those last hours.
              Then, in November, 2008 Daniel died suddenly, and with a clean autopsy. It is theorized that he passed of a sudden heart rhythm disturbance, the type often seen in children playing sports. It is theorized to have been something called Long QT Syndrome.
              Cammie is ten years old now. She lost her mother, and then she lost Daniel.  Within in past few months, her father, Ditto, passed at a very advanced age.  We still care for her as diligently as we ever did, exactly as Daniel would want it.  Cammie may have known losses, but she has also known stability in that she has remained at the farm in which she was born, all of her life. She has herdmates she has known all of that time. She has a brother who has always been here also.

                In late Fall this year, Daniel will have been gone for eight years. Sometimes it feels like it was only three years ago, and then other times it feels as if it were ten years ago. So many of Daniel's animals have lived to advanced old ages and then passed. The world has changed a good deal in the eight years since his departure.
                 And still, both Cammie and Daniel have the memory of playing together within weeks of her birth, on oak floors indoors, and on oriental rugs. Most of all I remember their joy while playing, as we worked so hard to keep Cammie alive in those early weeks.

                   And so, if there is a moral to this story and to life in general, it's that none of us know what is to come or can predict it. Of course we all need to work, because work is a part of life, but we also need to make time to do things we genuinely care about doing.  I can't account for my grandmother living to near one hundred when she had battled health issues from about forty on. I can't account for how a healthy child could die despite CPR one November day.  What I can do, is make sure that everyone I love knows it, and that the most important things I care about doing are done. Make sure that the animals you love know that too, as their lives pass so much more quickly than our own.  Don't be afraid to put your alpaca on an oriental rug if need be.

My husband with Cammie.

A September Flu

        

        I haven't been sick with anything other than a cold for about three years.  Somehow I have managed to catch the flu. I spent last evening figuring out what I should do since it's been such a long time since I had to treat myself for flu.  I started with extra vitamin C, then moved on to regular strength tylenol when I became febrile. I added Mucinex and lots of water when I became congested. Then, when I developed a wheeze. I brought out the nebulizer with medication which I will be using at least twice daily until this disappears.

           Since I didn't spend time yesterday exerting as much energy as I do normally, I didn't fall asleep easily when I went to bed. The program I was watching ended at eleven, and before you know it, my wheezing was back and it was midnight. Then I tossed and turned, drank more water and it was one. Then, the dogs barked
       Then, finally feeling a bit better, I lapsed into either unconsciousness or a deep sleep.  I found myself in a dream with my father.  Despite the fact that my father passed in 2008, he and I were in a navy blue Land Rover, and Dad was driving. This was interesting because most modern Land Rovers are automatic transmissions now, but this was my Dad, so he was driving a standard shift. He and I were making an evening run to some Goodwill Stores.  Once we got there, Dad found some new intelligence software that someone had donated. "This would be useful", he said,  as he presently doesn't have access to the software used in intelligence reporting. I bought some leather bags that were new and had been donated by a store to Goodwill. Dad also found a new pair of leather shoes which he delightedly picked up quite reasonably. I have no idea of the significance of this trip but I do appreciate my Dad visiting when it's possible for him. His appearances for visits in dreams help me to recall the feelings of his occasional visits and trips we made both together and with my kids. I will take these visits any way that I can get them.  Perhaps Daniel will come next time. They tend to visit separately, even though they both contend they "see each other all the time" and are in "close proximity".  I know that they care for my animals who have passed, and when they are away, the animals are cared for by Mrs Brandt, a friend of my family's from my childhood who loves dogs and other animals.

        I awoke with  simply a cold. I was a bit peeved that I could not keep the leather bags I had bought during the dream.  I am encouraged with the time I spend with Dad, and I am glad he finds a way to  visit me sometimes.

          Since cold and flu season is here, please consider getting a flu shot early.  Best wishes to you all.

The Truth of the Damaged Time Line

  When you lose a child, many physicians and ministers in particular, allot you a time in which to grieve of about a year. Then they expect that you heal sufficiently to head into what they call "the new normal". If you don't, they consider that you are grieving abnormally or perhaps even arrested in the development and maturity of your grief.

       I was a great little soldier through my grief. It's not because I am particularly brave or not in touch with the devastating loss we had experienced. It's that I had three other children and a husband who was understandably broken following our sudden loss of a healthy 12 1/2 year old beloved youngest son.  I was certainly broken. I just needed to make sure that everyone else would survive this loss before I fully examined what the loss of Daniel from Earth really meant to me.


         This November, it will be eight years since Daniel abruptly left his beautiful flesh suit.  Eight years later, I don't believe that there is a new normal. I think that what happens to most people is that they craft a life without their child or the loved one they have lost and they do so as if the life they lead is the result of a fractured timeline.  What I mean by that is that if Daniel had remained here on Earth, then he would be twenty years old. He would be in college or working.  He would have adult friends and be driving and planning for the future. He would be going places with his older siblings. They would be planning vacations together.  Instead, the branch of the tree that would have been Daniel's is now absent. The life we lead is not the one we would have. Our lives without him have continued to grow on that tree and as bright as some of the fruit in this timeline might be sometimes, the tree has now grown as a disrupted timeline.

The reason this is important is that in order to make best and most productive use of the life we have remaining, it's important to describe our situation, at least to ourselves, accurately. I don't cry much, although I think of Daniel each day. I miss seeing his wonderful life unfold. I miss his commentaries and I miss seeing what he would become. I will also miss seeing the family he would have made.

I don't believe that anyone who hasn't lost a child or a loved one can truly understand the pervasiveness of such a loss, or all of its implications.  This does not mean that I am lost. I accept and believe that God keeps Daniel and that I will see him again when I leave this existence myself.  I believe that at some future day we will be reunited.

     This does not stop my feeling that in late November, 2008 that the loss of Daniel altered the timeline we expected to live. The timeline was replaced by one with less joy.  I will continue to build the best life I can for my children, my husband, and my grandchildren, just as Daniel would have strenuously requested, had he had the chance to speak to us after his passing.

      Please remember that those you love who have experienced a crushing loss might feel this way also.  There is no genuine return to the days before such a tragedy. Be kind as you talk to others, especially those who know grief, either the anticipated kind, or the kind that envelopes us. May your "time line" be linear and as you expect.

         

Please See:" The Short Life of Peep"

Sometimes God sends some animals for a short stay here on Earth.

  Please see one of my other blogs, "Life After The Rescues" for the story of Peep, a Rhode Island Red hatchling at:


http://lifeaftertherescues.blogspot.com/2016/07/the-short-life-of-peep.html

Electronic Notes Through the Veil Which Separates Us

 Daniel,

      I know that you and Dad watch us sometimes.    Your sister had asked me to "inspect" her house before the appraisal for her refinance recently, and I felt you there with me.   I am also pretty sure that you and Dad were the ones telling me in dream to check the Summer house and that there was damage there. (Thank you by the way. I have hired someone for the repairs and they are under way.)  The caretaker phoned to tell me the same, the following day, after I had mentioned the dream to your Dad.  I still miss you both very much and I think of you both often.
        Daniel, you passed just after Barack Obama was elected, and from his writings you and I were both concerned about the direction of our country.  It actually has been worse than you and I had anticipated.  In some ways I am glad that you are not here to have seen the wanton disregard of our Constitution and the mismanagement of our country and world affairs by this regime.  The choices for the next election are not good.  One candidate is frequently dishonest and self serving and mismanaged her role as Secretary of State. Another potential candidate is out of touch and a communist.  The presumptive candidate for the Republican ticket says things that a lot of people think, but seems cavalier in some of his comments, and erratic sometimes.  Sometimes a small part of me is glad that you are home safely and not subjected to this.
       I know you pray because you always did.  Please pray for us, and for our country.  Your siblings especially have a hard road to hoe.  Your nephew will as well.  With that, I send the warmest hugs to you both.  I am doing the best I can.

Almost Eight Years Ago

  

I liked it, and I thought of you, but then I could not bring it home.

 
               

  Daniel,


            Many times I function very well.  I do what I need to do as a parent and as a grandparent.  I take good care of your animals and their descendants.  Every once in a while there is something that I see or hear which triggers less than a happy recollection.  I think today was one of those days.  I went to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription for someone and I saw a small blue and white house flag.   It said
        

     If tears could build a stairway,
    and memories a lane.
    I would walk right up to Heaven
    and bring you back again.

                             (Author unknown)

     
  I picked up the flag and added it to the few things I bought there. It will look nice on the small flag holder near the driveway. Then I thought about it some more.  You were called to Heaven supernaturally.  No clear explanation of why you passed has ever been demonstrated.  Repeated autopsies found nothing wrong but concluded that the manner in which you fell coupled with family history among older family members probably pointed to an abrupt cardiac arrhythmia.  You were called home by God in just a few seconds. Even though I gave CPR immediately, I never got you back. You were no longer there when I began.   If I were to build a bridge and walk up to Heaven to bring you home then I am doubting the plan of God. God needed you home in Heaven, and by saying I would bring you home I am doing something contrary to God's plan for you, for me , and for this family.    Still,  I love you and I miss you more than words can say.   I left the flag in the store.  I chose to trust God's plan for us all.  Perhaps this is as close to acceptance of what happened to which I will ever arrive.


              

Forgotten ?

             

Oil painting    Simon Gaon

 

        I have wondered how long it would take before people outside our family completely forgot about Daniel's passing. How long would it take for us to get to a point where his birthday would come and go, and no one would say anything, via card, or via e-mail or phone call ?   I have that answer now.  This week would have been Daniel's twentieth birthday had we been lucky enough to have his soul remain with us in a flesh suit here on Earth.  There was not one phone call, not one e-mail, not one card and few who came to the blog to see what would be here.  It took only seven and a half years for all of those who knew you to be absorbed by the Earthly and to forget. People have their own problems, their own grief and their own losses.

               It doesn't matter.  Our family won't forget. I won't forget.  For as long as I live you will be one of the most important reasons I came to Earth. Daniel, you and your siblings made the trip, as arduous, as difficult and as hard as it sometimes is, worth it.

                Today is Mother's Day and it looks as if that has been forgotten too.  It doesn't matter.  Had you been here, I know you would have remembered.  As I move through life more and more waits for me where you are.

Daniel's Twentieth Birthday

      

 
   Sometimes, it's hard to believe that this week, had you remained here on Earth, you would be twenty years old. It shouldn't be amazing to me. Some of your friends are in college and have girl friends, and are decidedly man sized.  In my heart though, you are somewhere between twelve and nineteen, a beautiful boy who simply had not yet been corrupted in the ever deteriorating world that the remainder of your family occupies. No wonder God called you home. Perhaps in his place I would have also. In dreams I have had, you have been about thirty, and so wise.

              This week I had an interesting experience.  Your sister and I were on our way back from an errand with her baby, and we stopped at a Burger King. I stayed in the car with the baby, and your sister went inside to get the food.  All at once, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a young man of about twenty walking from the highway up to the Burger King. For just a moment, simply from his walk, I wondered if it were you. As he drew closer, I could see that he had a red long sleeve t-shirt and a pair of khaki cargo pants on. He had brown hair with the same distribution that you had, and a bit of facial hair stubble as if he were attempting to grow a beard, but it had been a fairly recent thought. He walked right past the car, saw me, and there wasn't even a hint of recognition. Sometimes it still surprises me that someone who looks something like you, doesn't recognize me. It's silly, I know.   As I watched him walk into the restaurant I told myself that as of this week, that the man walking in would likely be the size you would be now, had you still been here. He was about six feet tall and of average to muscular build.

         When your sister returned with the food, she had seen him too and thought that he looked like you also.   I am at a loss as to what to do for your birthday this week. In the past I have sent canned goods to the food bank. I know you always enjoyed doing that.  Other years I have done a secret good deed in your name. Some sad years I have simply made you a birthday cake I know you would have liked. Of course, your brothers and sister, and now your nephew consume it.   This year I am already planning your cake. I will play the good deed by ear.

           There is less turmoil regarding your birthday and the anniversary of your departure from Earth. However, I am never okay with your being gone.  Sometimes, it's as if you are on a special outing, perhaps an exchange student program, and that my job is to keep the farm maintained and ready for your return. I know that is not going to be, but sometimes that's how it seems.

         I miss you and my Dad very much.  Happy Birthday........and I love you more.

A Visit to Elmira, New York in Dream

        

 

   Last night I had the most strange dream.  The family and I were traveling out of state to meet someone who was providing both a reference and a great opportunity for a job for our eldest son. The family was happy to travel there with him so that he could be alert and well rested for the appointment.  As he often is in my dreams, Daniel was with us.  We arrived in Elmira, New York and attended an afternoon party at the home of the man who was providing our son with a reference. He had a large home which had everything from a bar inside to an English garden outside. The party spilled throughout the house and through the gardens.  The gathering was very nice and we all had a nice time. We realized, as we took quite a time to gather our large family, that no one had seen Daniel since the beginning of the party.   The rest of the dream was spent with the family wandering through different businesses in Elmira looking for Daniel. He had visited several shops and had apparently left the party to explore. He had no cell phone.  Of course, in real life, Daniel has been gone for seven years. In real life, Daniel would not leave somewhere without someone knowing where he is and how to reach him. He would also have borrowed a cell phone in order to stay in touch. In the dream, I was truly worried and afraid because although he would be nineteen now, in the dream, he was twelve and a half.

              I awoke in a sea of perspiration, with the instant knowledge that I not only would not be retrieving him from Elmira, New York, but that he had been gone from Earth for seven years already. I have no idea why the dream was set in Elmira. I haven't driven through there since 1983 when I used to drive the rural routes from our home in rural New Jersey to Montreal.  In a sense, I suppose I lost Daniel during the journey that is life. Perhaps the dream is simply my own restatement of this.

A Message to Daniel

Sam Shepheard

Daniel,

 Today, one of my friends from Linkedin reported that his son Sam had passed overnight in his sleep. Most of us know how lost we would be, as parents, if we were to lose one of our children, especially unexpectedly. We could imagine what a loss and a devastation that could be. However, our family has actually lost a son unexpectedly.  You passed in an instant almost seven years ago, and although I recognize the shock, the loss and the grief, I am short of any real wisdom.

    What can I say to his father Craig ?   I could tell him that Heaven is real and that Sam is safe with God and is free from the limits our bodies and brains place upon our far more perfect souls. I could tell him that I have heard from you, and my Dad in dream, and that you have provided factual information in advance of our hearing it later from others here on Earth.   I could tell him that at first, when the pain is so new, that the memories of all that you and your child have shared, are locked away in your mind and your heart for safekeeping. Eventually, each of those memories come back one by one, almost in technicolor. The moments of your hugs and things you said are now some of the very best memories of my own life here on Earth. I want to tell him not to evaporate. I want to tell him that it's worth continuing to live and that there is good left in his life.  Sam will be there when it is time for him to leave this life.

       Daniel, if it's possible for you to welcome Sam, I would appreciate it.   I remember you, and think of you every day here on Earth.  I love you wider than the oceans and deeper than the seas, and I believe you have always known that.

        May God bless Craig and his family, Sam,  you and my Dad.


 

A Gift to Daniel

   

 

   One of the sad things about having lost a child, is that now, almost seven years later, I don't know what surprises would have come in terms of the music you would like.  Music is something we could have shared as you grew.  I knew what music you would have enjoyed at 12, but I can only hazard a guess as to what you might like at 20.

          Still, I thought of Daniel when I saw this.  This young man is Aston Merrygold.  He clearly has been influenced by Michael Jackson, but then there is a good deal in the song, and in the video that is his own.  For some reason, I think Daniel would have liked this, and have been amused.

        Aston Merrygold has an album which is about to be released in May, 2016 called Showstopper on Warner Brothers Records

          The song below is from that upcoming album.    Enjoy.


 

Waking From a Nightmare

                 

This is not Daniel. So far as I know, he never tried a cigarette or a lite beer. Someone sent me this picture and it looks so similar to him at five or six except that Daniel had lighter eyes. I decided to include it.

           Last night around three thirty in the morning, I had a strange dream.  We were all living in the blue house we had owned when the older children were small. Daniel had never lived there. He had been born in the next much larger home we moved to after this one.   In the dream, I came home in the afternoon from work and could not find Daniel.  I quickly tried to call everyone including the older children who were in college. I was hoping that someone had picked him up to do something, and I had either not known or had forgotten.  I had trouble making these calls because I had a new phone and could not get it to respond the way I wanted, especially in view of the stress of being worried.  None of them knew why he would not be at home today. When I called his school they said that he had not reported to school that day.  This is also strange because Daniel never attended school.  He was homeschooled all of his academic life. I also rarely if ever, worked during the day. I was consumed with worry. I went outside and called for him, as if he had simply been playing outside.  I knew something was very wrong, although I still hoped there was some sensible explanation for his absence that I had not considered. In the dream, I believe he was about nine years old.  I began to dial the police when I awoke. My heart was pounding and I was in a cold sweat.  However, waking from this particular nightmare brought no particular solace. Daniel is still not here with us.   Yes, he died suddenly and unexpectedly and was not abducted never to be heard from again. But his beautiful flesh and smile are still not here. He is still absent from Earth in the manner in which we always knew him.  I lay awake until four thirty when I decided to start the day.

                    Perhaps I had this dream because there was an amber alert on my phone yesterday. Perhaps my own psyche is trying to tell me that Daniel's passing from a sudden arrhythmic death is preferable to an unexplained disappearance. Sometimes, I tell myself that in a parallel dimension, there is a Daniel who still lives with us, and is not twelve and a half as he was at his departure from Earth, but who will be twenty years old in May.  I just know that I still have empty arms.