I was digging through my cedar chest today and found an old flash-drive that had the documents from my old computer.  I connected it to my computer and while looking at the documents I found this poem I wrote to my husband two years after he died in 2006.  I'm going to post it here...I'm not sure any of you will find it interesting; but this blog is a place for me to save the poems, experiences of spirit and insights I've had since losing my husband and son.

Such a beautiful man.
I thought you would live forever.
I would gaze at your profile as you drove
Or while you slept.

Your heart was strong
I thought it would beat forever.
Listening to its measured beats
As I lay with my ear on your chest.

You had a look of surprise
The day that pain gave notice.
Back pain; you'd had it before,
It would pass in time.

It was the look in your eyes
When the pain first came
That I would remember later.
You knew then what was coming.

Denial for me was a refuge.
I never believed you would die.
Someone else, perhaps
But not you, not ever you.

You acquiesced so gracefully
As I fussed around you (and raged)
You kept all that you felt inside,
Sparing us; as you always had.

As Cancer took its toll,
You became more beautiful.
I could feel your spirit,
Radiating beyond perimeters of flesh.

I never knew until then
How strong your spirit was.
Me, so reliant on your mental and physical strength.
Thinking that was who you were.

You were still beautiful when we buried you.
Looking so much like the young man I met,
When our bodies were as young as spirit always is.
We thought we'd live forever.

You have found forever; wait there for me
When I have found a way to embrace life
With all of the joy and gratitude you had,
Maybe then I will be ready to join you .

I was looking through my night-stand yesterday and came across a journal I kept after my Son died in 1996.  I hadn't seen it for several years.  It is a collection of letters I wrote to my son after his death; as well as an assortment of short entries about my feelings, insights and experiences of spirit that I believed (and still do believe) that my son sent to help me after his death.  One of the entries outlined an experience I had in the middle of the night on the very night he died.  I did not know when I had this experience that he had already died in his basement bathroom of an aneurism.  (I found him around 9:00 the next morning.)

I am going to copy the letter just as I wrote it in my "grief journal" not long after Jimmy died.

Dear Jimmy,

It has been almost four weeks since that awful morning that I found you dead on the floor of your bathroom.  You fell and slipped quietly away while I slept unaware two floors above you.  The coroner said you probably died around 2:00 a.m.  At 2:58 that morning I felt a light tingling touch on my shoulder and as I began to sit up to turn around to see who had touched me I happened to notice that time on the clock radio on your Dad's nightstand.  I then turned around and found Brianna standing quietly by my bed.  She had never gotten out of her bed in the middle of the night before; but I picked her up and put her in my bed.  I noticed she seemed quite wide-awake; but she finally settled down and we went to sleep.

The next afternoon; after all of it had unfolded; Heather asked Brianna "When did you last see Jimmy?" She said:  "In the middle of the night, he came and played with me and laid in my bed."  For some reason this didn't really register with me until a few days later when Brianna told me that you walked her in to mommy's room and said goodbye.  It was then that I realized who had touched me to wake me...it wasn't Bri as she is too small to reach up that high on our tall bed...it had to be you.  I knew you were there with your little sister; playing with her as you had in life, then bringing her to me as you said goodbye so she would not be left wide awake and wandering the house by herself!  I will never forget the gentle, shy touch that woke me up that night.

Love, Mom.

The experiences I share in this blog are precious to me; and quite personal; but I share them in the hope that they will help someone else along the path of grief and loss.

Jimmy's dad was out of town when he died; I had to call him out of a business seminar and tell him the awful news.  He then had to board a plane and ride home to Utah from Texas as he tried to process and deal with the terrible news of his oldest child's death.  Ten years and one month later; Jim died at 55 of stomach cancer.  I miss them both terribly; but take real comfort in knowing that they are now together.

I haven't posted for a long time. I'm posting a poem I wrote because there are times when I have a painful and very real need to go find my deceased (lost) loved ones. I know I cannot find them in the traditional way we find our living friends and family. I really don't need to "find" them because they are here with me all the time. It's just that their physical absence is so hard to deal with. When my son Jimmy died almost 16 years ago at 18; I felt a Mother's overpowering need to find him; to know that he was okay. I almost believed that if I went to the ends of the earth I could find him and bring him home. It was irrational, I knew that all along, but I felt such a tug. This poem is about that in a way.

If time and space were where you are

I search for you from star to star

I’d ride a blazing comet through

the deepest wormhole to find you.

I’d sail across the Galaxy,

on solar winds sans gravity.

On alien planets I’d stop to look,

and peek in every cranny and nook.

I wouldn’t stop till I could see,

your loving eyes looking back at me.

But you’re not here, in time and space;

You slipped into another place.

It’s not a galaxy away,

It’s in my heart; and there you’ll stay.

Okay....my last post was just too long...it will be a miracle if anyone has the time or inclination to read it. Today I'm posting a short one.

Hope sings,

Hope springs,

Hope is what I have.

I have been thinking a lot lately, about the nature of time. I've noticed that it isn't static; that it doesn't seem to flow along at the same even pace. It seems to run fast sometimes; at other times it seems to go painfully slow; and once in a great while it even seems to stop....depending on our shifting perspectives. As I look back over my life; time seems to fold up on itself...it all went by so fast! As I look forward; especially as I contemplate the realization that "time" is what stands between me and a reunion with my deceased loved ones; time seems to stretch out interminably. Sometimes, when I am thinking of my deceased husband or son, time seems suspended as I find myself re-living a memory. (I've noticed that sometimes memory is like reading previously read chapters in a book....the memory doesn't really live but seems like dry black words on white paper. They tell what happened in an earlier time; but you can't really see or feel it. Sometimes though; when I least expect it, and when I'm not trying too hard; a memory comes flooding back to me and flows with all the color and feeling I felt as the memory was being made. It is on these rare occasions that I am "transported" back to that time and place. The memories come alive and are so real; I experience them as if I am really back in the moments!)

When I had my own very brief "near death experience" as a five year old child; I experienced an out of body experience as my little body was "drowning" in a pool full of people. I remember so clearly that one of the most striking things about the experience was the realization that not only was I "out" of my body and looking down on the scene; but I was also "out" of time. I was in a timeless place and a timeless state. It wasn't long after this realization, as I watched my uncle pull me out of the water and put me on the side of the pool, that I found myself "back" in my body choking and gagging. This experience; remembered in detail as if it were yesterday; has helped me understand something about the nature of "time". I know it only exists for us here; that it is artificial....and that it does not exist in the spirit plane. The other thing I realized in those seconds/moments when I had this experience as a child; was that there is a part of us that does continue; that we do "live" on after death; and that we are still very much ourselves. I had an English teacher in High School explain to me that: "Time is an abstract entity; though it's effects are manifested in tangible and concrete ways." What we perceive as "concrete" are the cycles of life and nature. We actually live in the eternal present; though it seems we are "traveling" through time as we go through experiences that seem to happen along a linear lifeline. I've read many NDEr's (Near Death Experiencers) stories and they all talk about the fact that time did not exist when they were "out" of their bodies. Instead of talking about time passing during their NDE; they explain that everything, all experience and potential, seems to exist in that "place" all at once. The talk about going "deep" into the experience; where more and more of the truth and light of it is revealed to them; rather than describing it in terms of time. It's more of an unfolding.

I hope this makes some kind of sense to those of you who may someday read this. If we live in the eternal present; something that we can't perceive as mortals; (though we get glimpses of that paradox once in a great while) wouldn't it make sense to think that our deceased loved ones have never "left" us and exist in the same "Present" and and are all around us? I believe they not only live in the "eternal present" as we do; but they are also eternally present; we will see them when our true eyes are opened at death.

There is an old Helen Reddy song that I sometimes remember when I am thinking about the time when I will have my spirit eyes opened as my mortal eyes are closing. Some of the words go like this: "Time hurry by, carry me home, don't wait too long, knowing I'll travel much freer this time. And when I go home; my heart like a stone; he'll call me his own, when I go home."

I don't know why that song spoke to my heart when I was just out of high school...but it has always spoken to me of that time when I too will be going "home". I do not fear death; but I know that I have to fill up the "time" I have left here doing my best; and loving to the best of my ability to love, the ones who are still here in this time and place.

You

Such a small word.

Me

Even smaller.

I

Smaller still.

We

Bigger than I

Infinitely so.

Where did you go?

Where is the we

That used to be?

This is a poem I wrote after my husband died....I know he "lives" somewhere, somehow....but it is still so hard living without his physical presence. I miss him and our son sooooo much.

I have been thinking about the stress that life brings to each of us...especially when we have suffered through a loss. It's not just grief that we feel...that overpowering sorrow that seems to eclipse everything else; but with that often comes fear, and the stress that creates. FEAR. When my husband died in particular I felt overwhelming grief and fear. One of the first things my husband tried to get through to me after he died was that I shouldn't be afraid. He was very creative in trying to get through my wall of fear and grief. Sometimes in the midst of the emotion; we are not open to the messages of help and reassurance that our deceased loved ones are trying to give us. Not long after my husband died in 2006, I went with my cousin and Mom to a local book festival. Part of the agenda were workshops in everything from "Finding Your Inner Shaman", to "Writing your own story". We went to the Shaman workshop and were treated to an hour with a wonderful Native American Shaman from the Ute tribe. He was dressed in native costume; and told us about the Shaman traditions and healing. He cleansed the room with a burning sage bouquet; (smoking would be more the description); and told us about the Native American view of heaven and earth. After the workshop my cousin and I went to find a restroom before our next class. I had noticed an interesting and rather colorfully dressed woman across the room from me while we were in the Shaman class. She kept looking over at me with a odd look on her face. We encountered her in the restroom and she looked at me and said: "I need to give you a message." Startled I just said "What?" She said: "I feel I need to tell you not to be afraid." I was shocked; but knew that she had spoken to my need. I just mumbled a few words of thanks and left. I wish I had asked her more about why she felt to tell me that; and where it had come from. What I believed at the time, and still believe; was that my husband found a way to get that message through to me through her. He has brought real reassurance and comfort on many other occasions since. Sometimes I am open to the messages; and sometimes I am too steeped in fear. It's natural to feel fearful of the future when a spouse dies, but I think it's important to realize that fear gets in the way of finding peace and creative solutions for going forward. Fear can be crippling and influence decision making in ways that are not in our best interests. It also blocks communication from those who know best how to help us...those who have gone before. One of the things I have learned is that there is an undercurrent of peace and love in the Universe. In the midst of grief, fear and stress; it is possible to feel that oneness and all is wellness at times. I found that I was best able to do this when I went to a natural place...a lake, a canyon stream, a country path into the woods or fields. This is where you can best get in touch with what is older, bigger, timeless, and in harmony with that underlying peace. My heart goes out to all who are feeling the absence of loved ones; to all who grieve, to all who feel the fear of the unknown that comes with change.