Holy Week - Strength in Scripture

Holy Week – Strength in Scripture 

Sorrow

With my illness I often find myself wallowing in sorrow. Sorrow for the lost, sorrow for what was and what is to come, physically and spiritually, literally and metaphorically.

Deut. 28:65 “And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest: but the LORD shall give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind:”

Esther 9:22 “As the days wherein the Jews rested from their enemies, and the month which was turned unto them from sorrow to joy, and from mourning into a good day: that they should make them days of feasting and joy, and of sending portions one to another, and gifts to the poor.”

Job 6:10 “Then should I yet have comfort; yea, I would harden myself in sorrow: let him not spare; for I have not concealed the words of the Holy One.”

The Holy Spirit is my comforter during these trying days. As people hurry around buying their Easter Sunday dresses, scramble to have a feast for their family, sorrow fills my heart for those who struggle to have bread, for those who seek but do not listen. It is with sorrow my heart is heavy.

Job 17:7 “Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, and all my members are as a shadow.”

Pss. 13:2 “How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? how long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?”

Pss. 18:4 “The sorrows of death compassed me, and the floods of ungodly men made me afraid.”

Pss 39:2 “I was dumb with silence, I held my peace, even from good; and my sorrow was stirred.”

Pss. 69:29 “But I am poor and sorrowful: let thy salvation, O God, set me up on high.”

Pss 127:2 “It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.”

I pray for my family to know the love in my heart for my heavenly Father and not to remember me for the sorrows that haunted me. I sleep eight hours a night of peaceful rest. May they know when eternal rest comes I’m not bearing sorrow but eternal peace will fill my being of light.

Prov.10:22 “The blessing of the LORD, it maketh rich, and he addeth no sorrow with it.”

Prov. 14:13 “Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful; and the end of that mirth is heaviness.”

Prov. 15:13 “A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken.”

This verified illness is upon me as so many hidden illnesses encapsulate me. I cannot tackle one without the other and the sorrow from the heaviness overwhelms me at times with loneliness.

Ecc. 5:17 “All his days also he eateth in darkness, and he hath much sorrow and wrath with his sickness.”

Ecc.7:3 “Sorrow is better than laughter: for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better.”

Isa. 14:3 “And it shall come to pass in the day that the LORD shall give thee rest from thy sorrow, and from thy fear, and from the hard bondage wherein thou wast made to serve,”

Isa. 35:10 “And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”

Dan. 10:16 “And, behold, one like the similitude of the sons of men touched my lips: then I opened my mouth, and spake, and said unto him that stood before me, O my lord, by the vision my sorrows are turned upon me, and I have retained no strength.”
I longingly give you the fruit of the Spirit as I’m guided. My Holy Week will conclude and my New Year will begin. Even if it is only I who acknowledges the New Year it is mine to begin anew. A new breath, a new day, a new flame to my fire!

Jer. 31:25 “For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul.”

Hos. 8:10 “Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them, and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes.”

Matt. 24:8 “All these are the beginning of sorrows.”

I gave all I could give and have nothing more to present. His Word has wrapped around you and shown you the sorrows but the blind cannot see. I will not walk in the shadow of death, I will rise to see a New Year; a new day dawning. Man will taste sorrow.

Mark 13:8 “For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.”

John 16:22 “And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.”

2 Cor. 2:3 “And I wrote this same unto you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow from them of whom I ought to rejoice; having confidence in you all, that my joy is the joy of you all.”

Rev. 21:4 “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.”

May the Grace and Glory of God

be with you all

The Gamut Of Emotions

An Icy Morning

Jer. 9:23-24 (ESV) “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” 

The Gamut Of Emotions

After last Wednesday’s diagnosis I have been put through the mill of emotions; sorrow, pain, sadness, fear, grief, and believe it or not faith, hope, and joy. Now I feel like I’m being hit with a new emotion for the day, denial and off in the distance I can see anger galloping toward me. 

"No, it can’t be! They’re wrong. Wait for the test results. Doctors who know what to look for and feel for CAN be wrong, it’s rarer than the cancer you’ve been diagnosed with, but it does happen. Miracles happen too." < -- That's my mind talking. 

If you just thought to yourself after reading ‘Miracles happen’, “Yeah, she’s in denial.” Go away! Get very far away from me and leave me to believe all that I’ve believed and have already lived through and experienced in my life! MIRACLES DO HAPPEN!

You don’t think it strange that people of no faith haven’t experienced a miracle in their life? They’re the ones who allow doctors to be the last word, they allow doctors to be their miracle cure. Yeah, I’m not about to put my faith in man. You see the world today? It’s because people, millions of people have put their faith and trust in their fellow man! Don’t misunderstand me please, I believe Doctor’s serve a purpose, but I believe only YOU know what’s best for your body and they should work WITH you so you both have the same vision as to where to go in treating you.

You know where the miracles come from? Emptying your reliance on man and placing your faith and hope in a God who created the very disease/injury or illness you are struggling to rid your body of!

Here’s what I’m reading, from a friend who is on the same page as me in seeing HOPE; and it has only been because I see HOPE, not a death sentence that man wants me to see. Surrounded by survivors, I see HOPE.

Article Summary by A Von Butz.

*From the conventional medical perspective, cancer is a disease that for all intents and purposes is just as untreatable today as it was 40 years ago.

*Cytotoxic chemotherapy chemicals destroy both good and bad cells leaving aggressive cancer cells behind and leaving patients prone to more cancer.

*Radiation treatments are increasingly being shown to trigger secondary cancers in patients within years after administration.

*We rarely hear about patients actually being cured from cancer when opting for chemotherapy and radiation. At best, these treatments might help extend a person’s lifespan by a few weeks, months, and sometimes years − usually with serious side effects and greatly reduced quality of life. At worst, such treatments kill patients more quickly than if they had chosen not to undergo them at all.

*There’s no money to be made in telling you how to avoid cancer in the first place. The “bread and butter” of the cancer industry is unleashing the next, latest-and-greatest cancer drug.

Think about that. “There’s no money to be made,” in a nutshell, every illness and disease can be prevented and cured but the ones making the money on your illness and disease are NOT going to tell you about it. They’ll pump you with drugs and radiation before they tell you of the holistic treatments that are in testing stages. They’ll say, “Oh it’s very expensive,” but what they mean to say is, “My colleagues don’t make one dime on holistic therapy.”

Prayer results in promise! I believe in the power of prayer and as a witness of the way it effects me, just this Sunday I woke after what I believe, hundreds upon hundreds of people are praying for me. Not just in this country, in other countries as well. Not just of the Christian faith either, many faiths (even atheists and non-believers, mind you) are all sending their thoughts, their prayers, their positive energy toward ME! I woke and felt rested. I didn’t want to cry, I wanted to go out, look at cows, look at the landscape, breathe in the farm air. (Yes, if you know what a farm smells like, I WANTED to inhale the aroma!)

Most of my mind is a blur. I’ve been doing so much reading about cancer my brain hurts. I AM optimistic, that’s the good thing but I’m hoping my doctor’s share the same optimism and deliver to me a shared treatment plan that I can get behind. What I don’t want is someone telling me that THIS (cut you open, dispose of tissue, and radiate) is the only option. I want to hear what is out there and being tried and tested, I want to be the face of the cure not the face of the disease. I DON'T want to be microwaved!

Now keep in mind, I have never been operated on in my life, not even a tonsillectomy. I’ve never broken a bone or been in a cast. I’ve kind of sailed through life uninjured until I hit forty-seven and was hit with arthritis and severe gum disease. Now at fifty, I am being hit with breast cancer? Boy, God must see a strong little soldier in me all geared up and ready to go into battle and ready to FIGHT tooth and nail for a promising outcome! 

But through it all, I prayed. I steadfastly prayed and God has either answered immediately or made me patiently wait but rest assured, He has never let me down once! Now if He’ll just step in and let the Doctor’s know and understand that He’s in control and He’s got this and guide them to an informed treatment based on knowledge, not MONEY! I do truly believe from the very General Practitioner to the breast specialist to the timing of all of the appointments, God is here working His plan. Now just let me accept His plan. 

2 Cor. 12: 9 (KJV) “And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

Another Year (poem)

Psalms 116:8 “For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.”

Another Year…

Another year has passed us by

We’re told to laugh and never cry

Sometimes our eyes don’t know why

A tear rolls down our cheek.

Another year has come and gone

Often struggle to face the dawn

Too many days I just hold on

A tear leaks from my eye.

Another year with all I’ve lost

My family torn it’s what it cost

Memories of the miles I crossed

The tears they never stop.

Another year with Christmas day

Without you here the price I pay

Our lives enhanced is what I say

The tears begin to stop.

Another year in which I fight

To know if what I did was right

And when I see the star filled night

The tears all wash away.

A note from the author:

For forty years I've written my mother and father birthday and holiday cards. This is one to my mother this Christmas. After my dad passed away last year, the tears flow more easily but I am healing, my mother, not so much, she's lost the love of her life and no words, (not even my poems) can take the pain away. 

Think of people who are alone this Christmas without their lifelong spouses, or lost children. 

Christmas is NOT a MERRY time for ALL. 

God Bless one and all!

On This Day

1 Cor. 15:2 “By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.”

On This Day

On this day last year my dad passed away. This week has been a culmination of tears and memories leading me down memory lane. Every phone call to my mother this week has been of her rehashing the weeks that led to the final week which led to the day that my dad passed. I sat and listened allowing her to let out her grief so maybe she would find solace.

She tells me over and over again how my brother in Tennessee is still taking it hard and he let’s her know repeatedly how much he misses my father. Then there is the story of my sister who (now has his car) is driving around with a picture of my dad on the dashboard and how she wears the memorial necklace ALL the time.

I haven’t heard from ANY of my siblings since my dad passed. The last call to my brother was last year when he said, as we ended the call, to stay in touch and I did try, but as you can imagine he has his own family and doesn’t really have anything to do with any of his siblings anymore. There comes a time when the letdown is not worth the pain attributed to the lack of communication from siblings.

I can’t handle people saying over and over, “But that is your family; your blood.” I only have one dear friend who told me to just let them go and move on, the pain is not worth it, and he’s right. 

These past thirteen years haven’t been the easiest on me but I feel a peace here I’ve never had in my entire life. I feel loved; possibly for the first time an unconditional love that I only thought existed in fairytales. This time it is real because I feel it in my bones, in every essence of my being!

This week has been a stroll down memory lane. Many of the memories I’ve buried and plan to keep there but some memories good or bad surface like hot springs bubbling in anticipation of an explosion; none of which I’ll let come to fruition because I’m all about healing.

The bitterness inside will have to wait to eat away at me because this peace I feel now will not be ruined by any kind of confrontation and where my family is concerned, a simple chat is always a confrontational debate. 

Everybody grieves differently and while I wake and think about my dad daily, I don’t cry on a daily basis because I know he is at peace and don’t want us carrying on. I have to admit the only regret I have is not seeing him before he died and well, I’ll carry that with me to the grave but I’ve already told my mother that I won’t be coming back for her funeral either, not out of disrespect but out of love. After she leaves this earth, there will be not a thing tying me to that crutch of a place that tried strangling me to death all those years. She said she understands.  

That’ll be just another reason for my family to justifiably disown me and I’m okay with that since I’ve come to terms with my not being able to return. I’m at peace knowing I can move on in life alone but not ALL alone, I do have family here that has embraced me like their own and I have the most loving and understanding Heavenly Father.

So while I grieve on the one-year anniversary for my father’s death, I’m at peace knowing he is at peace and no longer suffering. While my family is back home living with regrets of what did or didn’t happen in their life, my only regret is not seeing my dad alive, one last time. And if I don’t get to see my mother one last time alive, I’ll deal with that regret when it happens. Until then… my poetry is what bound them to me eternally. 

Luke 1:79 (KJV) “To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

The Truth Hurts

Gen.1:1 “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”

The Truth Hurts

Well, yesterday was a good day even with summer rearing its ugly head to let me know it hasn’t gone too far away. Sometimes summer does that, it holds onto the season until the very last day and sometimes longer not wanting to let go and release the cooler temperatures of autumn!

After a quite refreshing couple of days in the fifties, eighty degrees raised the bar yesterday. Sure I stayed inside and did my work but I could feel the warmth tapping on the closed windows wanting to heat the house. Then last night we had a thunderstorm that washed away the heat in a light show beyond comparison. Flashing across the sky, lightning lit up the south, west and northern portions of the sky, the strobe light blinked in red and bluish hues. 

You could say I got a wake-up call yesterday in speaking the truth, right or wrong? I called my mother like I normally do at the same time every evening. I was in a relaxed mode as we had settled in to watch our movie but I pause the movie every evening to call my mother back home.

I could sense harshness in her tone but I shrugged it off as the conversation continued. She had said that she had a bad day, I knew what that meant but I prodded for more info and maybe I should have just ended the call by saying maybe a better day tomorrow but  it’s my mother, I needed to know if she was okay. 

A little back-story might help you with where I’m going with this. My mother lost her best friend, her husband of sixty years and she misses him intensely! A bad day means she just sits there thinking about him, his illness, his hospital stay, and most heart-wrenchingly, his death. As is to be expected, she has her good days and her bad days.

It hurts me to no end that I can’t be there for her but my calls have got to be enough at this juncture in my life and MY healing. She went on how my sister took her out to lunch and a little shopping. I know it’s good for her to get out and that is her healing mechanism, to shop. It always has been.

She told me about a book she read (this is where the conversation went downhill) about a young boy who died and went to heaven and came back and told this story of meeting Jesus in heaven and his deceased sister (that he had no knowledge of before the coma). The story Heaven Is for Real is the book she was referring to. 

She went on to tell me that because of THAT book she believes Heaven is for real and that ‘I’ should read the book to see for myself. I told her I READ a book that tells me heaven is for real called The Holy Bible. She retorted, “Oh, I’m going to read that one too.”

But then her tone became one of anger and she started berating me, “Why do you always have a conflicting response? Everything I say, you always try to correct me!”

Calmly I spoke and said, “I think I need to call you tomorrow.” I was not going to allow her bad day to leak through the phone and cause ME to have a bad day (too late) also. It already had in ways you don’t want to know. 

Was I wrong in telling her the truth? Should I let her believe Jesus is up there with a rainbow crown prancing with unicorns? Was I wrong in directing her to the bible? Should I let my mother holler at me like a two-year-old because she is grieving? I did and ended the call and afterward, I cried.

I told my son what had happened because he had overheard me, after talking to my mother, very loudly vocalizing my hurt from the phone call and then suffering a chest-tightening anxiety attack. 

His response? “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” 

Yeah, I spat that at him more times than once, now it was his turn to fling those sentiments at me. Boy, I'm batting a thousand in the feel good vibes!

I explained to him that I respect our difference in beliefs; I don’t force my belief on him, I already lost that battle and he is his own person believing what he wants. But no one wants to respect MY beliefs. So now here I am…

Tears roll down my cheek as I wonder if all of this is in vain. Am I writing the truth, yes I know it is MY truth, to believers or non-believers? Do the non-believers think I’m an overbearing, pompous, bible thumping donkey? Do believers believe the same truth? Prayer…lots of prayer time for ME coming up in the following weeks, I’ll let you know how it turns out.

I know grief has no time limit. I understand the mourning process. I have lost all four grandparents (not the same as a husband), I’ve lost two children (not the same as a husband), I’ve lost a father, along with aunts and uncles to illness or suicide (not the same as a husband); so maybe I don’t understand my mothers’ grief. Maybe it IS normal for her to buy my father's cologne so she can inhale the fragrance he once wore. 

I don’t understand the loss of a husband and truly hope I don’t have to ever cross that bridge but one thing I AM certain of is Heaven, FOR ME! I’m not certain if my father is there, I don’t know if my mother will wind up there, I don’t even know if I’M going to end up there but… I DO KNOW HEAVEN IS THERE! I will strive to reach heaven, long for it, and always feel it within my grasp. 

Maybe I should just shut my mouth and stop my fingers now.

Matt. 18:3 “And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."

MTOC ~ Day Two: Laid To Rest

Job 22:29 “When men are cast down, then thou shalt say, There is lifting up; and he shall save the humble person.”

My Testimony of Christ

Okay, where was I? Read yesterday’s post.

My mother and sister had a disagreement this weekend and in dysfunctional familyesque form, my sister told my mother that she died when I was born. Mind you, my sister was three years old when I came along. I was the sixth child to be born and better yet, I was born on my mother’s birthday. I ruined my sister’s life by being born and paid for the anarchy that ensued in the following years.

My sister felt slighted from that day forward. She was no longer daddy’s little princess because this new baby came along with a shining smile and stole all of her limelight. I guess I was THAT cute from birth. That was sarcasm. 

I’m not here to tell my sister’s story. But I will say that when my mother told me what my sister said it hurt; another wound on my skin, another scar to add to the fold. I was angry, enraged, bitter and wanted to go on facebook and announce to the world that my sister was a total piece of …

I stopped, “Dear God help me!” It’s all I could do to calm down. I said yesterday how He took me in and saved me, so in my times of distress that is all I know to do, turn to Him. I sat and prayed and as I did memories came flooding back; memories I would have rather laid to rest but they resurface anytime my sister takes out her sword and stabs me with her jealous needles.

I have a friend who told me once, “You have to put the past behind you and leave your blood family behind. We’re your family now, your spiritual family!” No truer words were ever spoken. My family doesn’t know me anymore, I’m the kid (I was thirty-seven) who left home and left them to pick up the pieces of the family puzzle that I left lying on the floor. 

A twenty-year marriage shattered because I listened to God; not to the family or husband who wanted me bound to their whim. I catered to them and weaved them together so that we formed some form of semblance of a family but when I left, with two-weeks notice, the puzzle burnt in a flame of fire. No one spoke to me, no one reached out to see if their little sister who went almost fifteen-hundred miles away with a total stranger was okay. They were glad to be rid of me finally so they could get the attention they didn’t receive in their lives because of this baby who ruined life for them. 

They were then mad; mad because the family was left in pieces without me. They resented the fact that I was going on with my life, never to see them again. I tried the phone calls, I tried with blistered fingers to stay in touch but the calls became farther and fewer in between. I was now bitter with my family but on a road of healing. 

All of those years I was blind to the way I was treated. Not by my mother and father who yes, treated me with the utmost respect and loved my son and showered him and me in love. My brothers and sister didn’t receive that love. When my father was sick, he’d call my husband in the middle of the night for a ride to the hospital, we jumped. We took my mother food shopping weekly, we took care of her house when she went away, we respected one another and THAT is all that I miss now. I can’t say I miss my siblings because I have a lifetime of resentment built up inside of me of abuse: physically, sexually and mentally. 

Why am I telling you this when some things should remain private? I have to heal and God wants me to release this story to the world. Had I not found God, on my own mind you, had I just stayed in the dysfunctional life I was living and breathing, I would not be a writer, I would not have watched my son graduate high school, I would have never found a family that knows what love truly is.

I was a stone cold alcoholic by the age of sixteen, married at seventeen, and on a road of struggling to survive this thing we call life. At twenty-one, I found myself needing sobriety to continue living. As you can imagine going alone, I had only one resource and that was the very being who had been beside me all of my life guiding me.  

I took on a new role, I became a spiritual light for all who came in contact with me. As you can imagine this newly changed person was even LESS accepted by a dysfunctional family let alone the messed up world. I was illuminated by His Word and carried the torch out into the troubled world wherever I went.

I thanked God daily for my struggles, for my suffering because I knew through every step I was finding a place of healing for ME. God had handed me a flashlight to carry into the darkest of caverns in my life. The batteries never ran out as long as I kept my focus on God and the Light he instilled in me to carry.

The very core of my spirit was strengthened. I was clawing my way through skin and bones to find healing. You might say I was alone; no sugar-daddy to pay my way through the gravel, no medical intervention to drug me up and save me, I had nothing but God. Nothing, no one, just God and me on the journey!

Why did God reach down and save me from the pit I was obviously in; abuse, depression, anxiety, alcoholism and drug addiction? Why did He choose me to be a light to others who might be struggling with their path that is full of darkness? I often ask why but inside I know why. This world is covered in utter darkness and He needs people like me, just as Jesus needed the downtrodden of society to get His message across, God chose me because I am a humble servant giving all Glory to Him!

I have lain my past to rest. To be continued…

Matt. 11:29 “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

The Cave Dweller No More

Luke 12:27 “Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.”

It seems like the last year I’ve been living in a cave. The world is going on around me and many things have gone on in this world that I care not to discuss because I can discuss them quietly at home and in the depths of my mind, I don’t need all of my thoughts out there for the world to see.

I stop by facebook once a day to see what people are sharing and well, it’s the same ol’ same ol’ basket full of deceit, cunning opinionated news (usually lies), abused animals, lost children and prayer. My page is full of prayer request and that is just how I like to start my day by being in prayer for those in need. 

I’ve changed my facebook page so much I no longer get the negative feed that was turning my stomach early last year. With every visit my heart hurt, my mind ached and I was left puzzled by some of the things people felt the need to share, so I climbed into the cave crowded by grief and didn’t ever want to come out and view the social world again.

Something happened along the way. God spoke to me and asked me what I was doing sulking in the cold darkened damp cave. Never one to shy away from God, I told Him the truth about what was bothering me. He set me on a straight and narrow path and I came out the other end of the cave dragged there by the light that was pulling on my shirt.

After God showed me what was wrong, I took action to change. Then the New Year erupted and I made a commitment to be more focused on my writing craft. I don’t need a best selling novel, I need to WRITE! If I write one word that changes the way people see the world, one word that speaks volumes to them, one word to encourage them, then my writing is not in vain, my gift is being used the way God intended and the positive energy that comes from my writing will light me up and allow me to SHINE!

Since I don’t believe in coincidence, what do you make from this meme that came across my feed? 

“God wants to bring you out of your cave, out of that place in your mind where you have been lost.”

Now some will say, it’s just a meme. Well, since I believe God works in mysterious ways, more ways than the human mind can comprehend, I believe I was in the right place at the right time. Has that ever happened to you? Well it clarified what was truly on my mind and that is that God doesn’t want me languishing in the cave. He wants me out here in the spinning world sharing my words that are ‘on my mind’ and words that might reverberate in other minds also. 

Also, this lovely sentiment came across my screen:

Believe it... in your mind. 

Receive it... in your heart. 

Achieve it... in your life.

I sat up, took notice and got busy working on the plan God has set before me to change the darkness into light, to take a breath, inhale and exhale the positive flow that needs release to this world of negativity. 

I know it’s a stretch but if others see me actively taking a stance to change, maybe they too will follow suit and by years end I will have changed some small portion of the world. Remember this, social media is not just a place to share pictures, memes, and what the news media wants you to believe, it is also an avenue to share the true inner you that the world has come to know and love. 

Continuing down the same path as last year, you are consciously blocking the pathway to change. The choice is up to you my friends. Live, grow and change! It is after all a New Year.

God Bless each and every one of you!

2 Thes 1:3 “We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth;”

Shine

Job 3:4 “Let that day be darkness; let not God regard it from above, neither let the light shine upon it.”

Shine

This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine!

This is my decision as I head into a new year; I’m going to shine! The light in me shined a little in 2015 but I could feel it being dimmed. Saturated by circumstances my light was fading as the year was closing. I could feel the tug of war going on inside my soul and as I grabbed tightly to the light within my spirit, I felt it had diminished from a thick rope of strength to a small thread of nary any hope hanging out there in the darkness that I had a hard time holding onto.

The year began with a death (1-25), then yet another death (10-29) and is now being led out in chains with a death (12-14). Not a great year by any means. My candle had burned out, no more wax and no more wick to keep it going and I fizzled. It was as if someone came with wet fingertips and just doused the light that was left in me shining. By years end, I could shine no more. I felt like a deflated water balloon left over by kids of summer just lying in the grass. 

My Christmas day was spent with family and it was really the first time I had spoken about the tragedies of the year with someone other than my mother and my husband. I kind of felt good not just writing about it but also vocalizing about my dad, my aunt, and my uncle. When I woke up on the 26th of December I felt a small burning inside of me, a sensation of a new torch being lit by the match within.

I sat and wrote and by Monday the 28th my candle was fully lit, the flame burning high and a new sense of peace washing over me as if I had been reborn and given a second chance on life. The year of gloom that had hung over my head like a wet napkin was slowly falling apart and diminishing into nothing. I realized I had a light that NEEDED to shine, just a few more days.

Writing took a backseat as I wallowed in self-pity. Not that I had writers block or anything, I just didn’t feel like writing and when I did, none of it made much sense. This year I have had the least amount of posts in my blogging history! Well, no wonder my light was dim! Me without writing is like a baby without their security blanket. It left me feeling all whiney inside (sometimes outside)! 

Well let me tell you, my mother sent me one of the warmest blankets I’ve had in years. A security replacement? A warmth more penetrating than a roaring fire! Whatever it is, I feel like I’m coming back from a year long holiday, one that I didn’t take by choice, it was one that life threw at me, forced me into and asked me to just deal!

As the worst year of my life wraps up, I’m looking ahead and seeing a light shining in the not too far off distance, it’s quite close and appetizing to say the least. This little light of mine? I’m gonna let it shine! Let it shine! Let it SHINE! LET IT SHINE!

Godspeed my friends!

Prov. 4:18 “But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.”

The Box

“Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.”

The Box

It came without fanfare it came without ribbons and bows but it was the box that I was anxiously waiting for with memories of my father. It looked like any other box that comes in the mail, all wrapped in brown paper and taped beyond belief. I had quite a hard time getting into the box and it smelled kind of funny.

My mother had been building on my excitement the entire month when she said what was going to be in the box (minus my necklace) that still to this day has not been made ready by the funeral director!

This season has not been an anticipated season and to be honest, I’m quite down. I lost one of my favorite aunts in the beginning of the year and just last week I lost one of my favorite uncles, AND I lost my father at the end of October which is kind of putting a damper on my celebratory Christmas spirit!

My concern lies with my mother who is a brave ol’ soul enduring a lot and being a comfort to my aunt, her sister, in her time of need. Friday, the day of the funeral, I was supposed to go see Steven’s family and when Thursday came, I told him I just couldn’t do it in all good conscience. I was down and didn’t want to say anything that I’d regret. I couldn’t wear a mask and pretend all is right with the world when my world was crushed, my heart broken and my spirit in a quite stir.

My days on Facebook have halted for a spell because it is full of cheer and happiness. Can people REALLY be all that happy? It’s possible but I don’t know, I think they wear a mask over their sadness and make the world think they’re all happy as a horse. It could be my own sadness seeing things that aren’t there and that is totally possible too because I’m in a serious funk!

The box – it lifted my spirits on a day shadowed in death; it arrived. There was some good news and… some bad news. The good news was that it arrived! The bad news is that the Old Bay seasoning that my mother sent had been damaged, meaning in transit the lid popped off and splattered all over everything. The m&m bag was split open (shut up Benning) and Steven was a sport (the m&m’s were for him) ate for the first time Baltimore seasoned m&m’s!

She had put in there the funeral cards, some pictures, three lighthouses (for Adam), and two seasonal throws, one for me and one for Steven. They certainly gave new meaning to the SEASONal blankets, covered in Old Bay. Mind you that Old Bay is hard to come by out here in the midwest and that is why she sent it to me from Baltimore, land of the crab lovers.

Then my most prized possession that I was awaiting, the binoculars! These binoculars have sentimental value beyond belief! My dad acquired them from the shipyard he worked at over 40 years ago and they have been everywhere; Ocean City, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Florida, and of course Maryland. My dad treasured these naval binoculars.

I held them in my hand, while dusting off the Old Bay, and could feel my dad’s hands wrapped around them. I put my eyes to the peepholes (ouch) and just a little burn from the Old Bay but they were here, in my hand, in MY possession! Every child in my family wanted these but they were the first thing I asked for when I got the sad news my dad had passed.

After the arrival of the box, my mood swung from happy to sad and then happy then sad. I was and AM on a roller coaster of emotions and I want off! I felt sad that I had turned down a visit to see his family but in all honesty, it was for the best. We all walked away happy and that is truly what I wanted.

Now onto Christmas…

“Welcome, Christmas, bring your cheer. Cheer to all Whos far and near. Christmas Day is in our grasp, so long as we have hands to clasp. Christmas Day will always be just as long as we have we. Welcome Christmas while we stand, heart to heart, and hand in hand.” Dr. Seuss,  How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Tis the Season...

Half of my collection

John 4: 23-24 “But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.

God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

I haven’t written since Thanksgiving and we’re well on our way to the most blessed season of the Christian life. While Thanksgiving came and went, as much as I felt thankful I was also riddled with grief. 

I’ve heard over and over how grief fluctuates and I’m no stranger to grief but have never grieved in this magnitude before. Yes, I lost two children and grieved immensely but I didn’t let the grief take hold of my life and I made some semblance of a life after their deaths. 

I knew my dad was very sick and I tried to prepare myself for the ending but like a good book, we never want it to end and always hope that there will be a sequel. My only hope of a sequel with my father dying, is knowing that he is basking on the shores of heaven and the sequel will rise when I join him. 

Thanksgiving was more than grief for my father; it was a longing to be home with my mother who is fighting her own battles of moving on in an empty home where the two of them shared their days on a 24/7 basis. She is now lonely holding emptiness in her hand and I long to be there to comfort her in her time of grief.

December 2nd was Christopher’s birthday and I came to the realization that I am the mother of a thirty-three year old son, had he been allowed to stay here on this crazy planet. I find solace in knowing that he didn’t have to be a part of this insanity that we call life and that he has an even bigger role in the place we call Heaven!

We had snow on Thanksgiving and hubby worked out in it for four hours in the wind and temps no higher than 25 degrees that day. He also drove in the mess but he did have the pleasure of being home for turkey dinner and home comfortably on Black Friday. Adam and I on the weekend began the Christmas decorating and as of Monday the place was looking like Christmas had kissed and blessed the scene. 

The holidays are shadowed in a new color for me, and I imagine many others, the color of grief. While lights dazzle, tinsel sparkles, snow glistens the bubble surrounding many homes this season is a somber gray, echoed by candlelight and showers of prayer washing over not only people but also a nation in the midst of sadness.

I know many people put on the show of glitz and glamour, hug tightly to the materialistic glow that surrounds the season, find themselves nestled in parties and booze all the while many are out here suffering through the pains that come along with this season, the season of joy, now the season of grief.

I won’t allow grief to ruin my Christmas; after all it is the season that we celebrate the Lord’s birth. I won’t allow fear of the unknown to ruin my Christmas because that is what the terror seekers want for us, to live in fear and I won’t allow that to happen. I will allow fear to empower me and to continue in this season with joy and hope in my heart. 

The prayerful soul that I am will bless you all as you too meander through this season. Go with peace, share the love and Light that Jesus stood for in His coming and prayerfully walk with God as you embrace the diversity that rest assured will slap us in the face in the coming new year.

God bless you all!

John 1:4-5 “In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”

I'm Back... With a Purpose

Micah 6:8  “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”

I’m Back... With a Purpose

In the midst of my grief I found something. It was there all the time I just needed to grab hold of all that I knew I had in me and that is my FAITH! One to never let me down, God set upon me a new mission, one that I had strayed from but He brought me back through my faith.

Yesterday’s sermon was about the future and knowing your purpose in the here and now. It really touched me because I was snuggling up to my grief and looking for a promise in my tears. As usual I found it in a sermon cradled among truth.

Sometimes people feel scared, afraid they’re not doing all they can in the Lord’s eyes whether a florist, a doctor, a gardener or a janitor. Sometimes people feel that between resting on Sunday and going back to work on Monday is just a mundane chore they do to keep food on their plate. Really? You feel so unworthy that that is all you feel your purpose is in life? To put food on the table and pay bills?

If in the mundane you see purpose, your inner essence and being will come to life like a newly planted spring garden. The florist feels like it is just a job organizing and arranging the flowers while making money, but in essence of completing her purpose she is touching the lives of other people. How you might ask? When you’re lying in the hospital and a flower arrives, how does that make you feel? You’re not thinking of the person who is serving a purpose in bringing that arrangement to life. Instead you’re smiling and feeling good! This person was touched by the florist and didn’t even give her a second thought. At a funeral, the florist is reaching into your realm and making you feel love and beauty surround you in a dark moment of despair.

How about the nurse? Are you thinking of her dedication to serving her purpose in life? No, I imagine all you are thinking about is her poking and prodding and how annoying it is to lose control of YOU and YOUR faculties. The nurse is serving her purpose in bringing you your medical needs and see that you are comfortable on this, as you see it, demeaning journey.

How about the janitor? Are you thinking of their job as fulfilling a purpose? Of course not, again you’re thinking of you and how you’re just glad that there is toilet paper on the TP holder after you’re done your business. You don’t think of anyone as fulfilling a purpose but as I see it, we’re all here fulfilling the purpose that God has set for us.

Sometimes people feel that they’re not doing enough in fulfilling their purpose and get emotionally drained thinking what next? What will I do? They worry needlessly when they should take their need to God and He WILL fulfill your need in serving His purpose. Remember, He put you here for a reason and that is to serve His purpose.

When people get distracted from their purpose they begin to lose faith. They don’t want something higher than themselves controlling what their purpose is so they wander into selfishness and hold tightly to materialistic views and they go on in life serving nothing but their ego.

MY purpose is to write. Even when I feel like my writing isn’t reaching out to someone, that one person will let me know that I’ve reached into his or her heart in some way and thus fulfilling my purpose. I lost sight of that for a while thinking there was really no reason to write but in the layers of grief I found my writing to not only be essential to the my healing but to be substantial in finding my purpose while helping others.

I serve God through my writing. He blessed me with the talent to write. He had me training on many levels all of my life in my cleaning houses for those who were often too disabled to do it for themselves, taking care of the elderly when they couldn’t nurse themselves, tending to the lonely widow who just needed friendship. God used me so my heart would know and understand compassion for all and then my writing would be used to relay a message of the promise that He had shown to me.

I’ve spent enough time in my grief and now it is time to fulfill my purpose in serving God. You do know that if you are not serving God, you are only serving yourself? We live in the ‘all about me’ generation and people are not so happy with the sun not rising for THEM! The world should turn and bow for THEM. They seek ‘things’ outside getting lost in pain and sorrow and never look at the healing that is right there on the inside waiting for them to embrace.

We all have a purpose in this life and until you understand what the purpose is and that EVERY single person has one, maybe the world would change. We can’t let evil scare us into not seeing a reason for everything under the sun.

Jesus was a carpenter for most of His life. Do you think he sat there twiddling his thumbs asking God what his purpose was in life? I don’t think so, he knew God was shaping him into a man who would carve out a nation, build a world of love out of the sands of time, hammer into the people a voice that would be heard for millennia, seal the message and purpose with nails so that the blood would set us free. Once Jesus understood His purpose, His life was fulfilled.

Luke. 21:34 And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares.

Reasons...

Job 17:7 Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, and all my members are as a shadow.

A Reason

As you can imagine in the depth of my grief, I search endlessly for reasons why things are the way they are. My dad was in the hospital for three weeks when he finally succumbed to COPD in the same hospital room that my grandmother had passed.

I’ve gone over the WHY’S:

Why did he die?

Why was I not there?

Why am I here (in Nebraska)?

Why didn’t I make it to the funeral?

Why didn’t my poem reach his ears?

Why, why, why?

Then I went over the reasons behind all the WHY’S. I wasn’t torturing myself I was more like self-analyzing all the reasons there are for the way things happened the way they did.

Let’s go in order:

Why did he die?

Well, he didn’t just die. For twenty years since his first heart surgery my father had sought out God. He had become closer to God in his final years, not saying he attended church or anything but in his own way he embraced his religion, what it meant to him and where he’d go in the final chapter of his existence, heaven.

My father suffered for many years with heart problems and the last few years it had gotten worse. He was a survivor of throat cancer and watched his sister succumb just this year to the deadly colon cancer (among other cancers she was hit with), and he’d watch from afar his brother-in-law fight with lung cancer.

Over this past year my dad would need more and more oxygen. It got to the point he barely made it to the car with the heavy tanks he had to carry with him. He struggled to breathe on a daily basis. Something we too often take for granted, he was relinquished to begging for more.

Why did he die? Because his heart and lungs couldn’t take it anymore. There was not enough oxygen on this planet to fill his lungs so he had to go to the place where he could breathe easy without any struggles, heaven.

Why was I not there?

It just wasn’t meant to be. I carry a smidgen of guilt but am relieved when I go over the reality of not being there. Reality, something no one wants to hear, they just want to play the point-the-finger-at-the-lousy-daughter game. Yeah, my brothers are back there in Baltimore pointing fingers and wondering what kind of daughter doesn’t make it to her own fathers funeral. I’ll tell you what kind, the kind that lives in the REAL world!

Had I had $3,000 dollars hanging out of my pocket I surely would’ve hightailed it back to Baltimore disability and all. The reality of the matter is, I don’t have $3.00 hanging out of my pocket. I have a roof over my head, I have food on my plate, the house is heated and I have a wonderful husband! Can anyone say they really want more? Then you my friend are a prisoner of a false reality. I don’t live for WANT, I live for NEED and am provided for my needs daily! I WANTED to  be back home but apparently I wasn’t NEEDED.

Let me let you in on another reality. I have two brothers that could’ve very well paid my way back there with no skin off their nose! Did I WANT them to? No! They have their cable bills, their new cars and trucks to pay for, their season tickets to football/baseball games, goodness, where would they EVER find spare cash to help their sister?

My one brother from Tennessee drove eight hours back home but allowed my mother to pay for his hotel for three nights? I forgive him for that since he is the one who paid my mother’s $150 a month garage fees to park their car for the past five or six years. My other brother is a drugee, and my sister has a rental place with her three kids living there.

Why was I not there? 

For the plain and simple reason, MONEY. Sad but true. The reality of life is, that EVERYTHING boils down to money, remember that.

Why am I here in Nebraska? 

Because a man saw a wounded soul 1400 miles away from him and just like a puppy in the middle of the road, he saw to it to rescue me from death.

Why didn’t I make it to the funeral? 

For the reasons above of why I wasn’t there in Baltimore. If you read into the picture I painted of my family, they are who they are and I am no longer a part of them; that bothers them to no measure. I’m happy with nothing (but everything) and they are miserable with everything and more.

They didn’t want me back there because they love me, they wanted me back there to relieve their conscience and so they’d have something and someone to talk about.

Why didn’t my poem reach his ears?

My sister had my last words to my dad on her phone and she was ‘going’ to read it to him but didn’t find the time. Did she read it at his funeral? No. Why? Because she was taking care of other matters that were more important than my last wish to my father.

It wasn’t meant to be. My poem finally made it to my mother via snail-mail and her words were somewhat hurtful, “I’m glad your father didn’t hear this before he died, because it was SAD!”

I’ll tuck that one under my belt.

So again I’ll ask, why am I here in Nebraska?

Because the Lord saw me worthy to be loved! To know what love IS! To feel HIM wrapped around my heart and to bless ME!

While my mother and father were the only two that truly loved me (back home), my siblings claimed to love me but I say to you, to KNOW love is to SHOW love, and in thirteen years I have not been shown love by any of my siblings.

Granted, if they read this, they’d spew that I don’t know what I’m talking about, and * I* never SHOWED THEM love. It’s a tit-for-tat game with them, a game I quit many years ago, out of LOVE for my self and my sanity.

Also granted, that if they knew I was writer, they’d read my words. They love me so well. (Yes I gave them a link to my writing but they lost it somewhere over the years.) Remember, if I’m not making MONEY, then I’m not a writer.

All my WHY’S and REASONS have been answered and now I search for PEACE in the midst of my grief. I go with faith in my hand and God in my heart and I move on to the next phase of my life. I feel the wind beneath my wings…

God bless you all!

Pss. 38: 8 I am feeble and sore broken: I have roared by reason of the disquietness of my heart.

Quotation Saturday ~ Healing Through Grief

Prov. 18: 24 “A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.”

Quotation Saturday will be a little different this week. Since I lost my father last week and he was put to rest this week. My emotions have run the gamut; I wasn’t there and that is tearing me apart. I will find healing in my grief.

HURT

“Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word.”

― George R.R. Martin

~ This is so true! I realized what kind of family I have when old wounds to my soul resurfaced this week.

“I have learned now that while those who speak about one's miseries usually hurt, those who keep silence hurt more.”

― C.S. Lewis

“Pain is a pesky part of being human, I've learned it feels like a stab wound to the heart, something I wish we could all do without, in our lives here. Pain is a sudden hurt that can't be escaped. But then I have also learned that because of pain, I can feel the beauty, tenderness, and freedom of healing. Pain feels like a fast stab wound to the heart. But then healing feels like the wind against your face when you are spreading your wings and flying through the air! We may not have wings growing out of our backs, but healing is the closest thing that will give us that wind against our faces.”

― C. JoyBell C.

~ Hurt equals pain and this week the pain hasn’t ceased. I’m working on it though and I’ll find that wind in my face called healing!

EMOTIONAL

“There are some things in this world you rely on, like a sure bet. And when they let you down, shifting from where you've carefully placed them, it shakes your faith, right where you stand.”

― Sarah Dessen

~ I relied on my family to actually care for my pain. Knowing I had no means of seeing my father in his last weeks or as he was laid to rest, no one cared, except friends that I’ve never met! My spiritual online family got me through what would turn out to be one of the hardest things in my life.

“So the fact that I’m me and no one else is one of my greatest assets. Emotional hurt is the price a person has to pay in order to be independent.”

― Haruki Murakami

~ I’m paying for my independence and my freedom but I WILL heal!

ANGRY

“There are two things a person should never be angry at, what they can help, and what they cannot.”

― Plato

~ I cannot help that I have a selfish family. My heart and prayers are with them. 

“Do not allow yourself to be blinded by fear and anger. Everything is only as it is.”

― Yuki Urushibara

~ I’m going to remember this every single day!

“Speak when you are angry, and you'll make the best speech you'll ever regret.”

― Laurence J. Peter

~ This is why I write. My writing has healing properties.

“If you're angry at stupid people, you're tempted to join them.”

― Toba Beta

~ I’m sure not going to allow myself to go there!

GRIEF

“You will lose someone you can’t live without and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up and you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.”

― Anne Lamott

~ This is true. It might hurt for a little while but my heart is filled with the love I carry for my dad, so he will be a part of my healing too. I may walk with a limp, but I’ll dance like a pro for my dad!

“Tears shed for another person are not a sign of weakness. They are a sign of a pure heart.”

― José N. Harris

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars,

The deeper the grief, the closer is God!”

― Fyodor Dostoyevsky

~ I can attest, I’ve never felt closer to God than this week with my unusual amount of shooting stars. Thanks Dad.

“Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.”

― Leo Tolstoy

~ AMEN!

HEALING

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”

― Rumi

“It has been said, 'time heals all wounds.' I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.”

― Rose Kennedy

~ I feel as though I am one big scar but the only good thing is the beauty of my light will shine through and no one will see the scar, they’ll only see the Light that I emit.

“Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real.”

― Cormac McCarthy

“As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation -- either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course.”

― Martin Luther King Jr.

~ I choose to transform! I’ll use writing to help in the healing process.

I’d like to thank all of my spiritual online friends who are there for me, helping me and honestly doing all they can for me. They’ve lost a mother or father and understand the pain that I’m enduring and it is only with their love and support that I’ll find the healing transformation that I need. God has truly blessed me!

Acts 4:22 “For the man was above forty years old, on whom this miracle of healing was shewed.”

Mixed Emotions

Ecc. 7:3 Sorrow is better than laughter: for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better.

Yesterday was not a good day, not a good day at all. It would be the day of my dad’s funeral. The day that family all gathered ‘round sharing tears, memories and love. There would be brothers and a sister, aunts, nieces and nephews, maybe cousins who I haven’t seen in ages all gathering to show their love for my father. There would be something missing from the family gathering…namely me. A series of mixed emotions would encompass my entire day.

Steven was very sick yesterday. Well, seriously he’s been sick for two weeks, first with a nasal infection but it seemed to have cleared up but by Monday something was running amok in his chest. He has asthma and breathing had become very tiring for him and by yesterday when I woke he announced, “I have to go to the doctor!” I scurried to get dressed in record time and we were at the doctor by 9:30.

I had first called my mother to make sure she was okay on what would be the hardest day of her life, putting her husband of sixty years to rest. I tried to keep it together but by the time we returned home from the doctor, I was once again on the phone to my mother seeing to it that she was going to be okay. She assured me that she would be, she had loving family surrounding her and she’d be okay.

After the phone call I broke down sobbing like a child who lost her puppy. I run the gamut of emotions from sadness, anger, guilt, shame, hate, love, sorrow, grief, concern despair and sympathy. No wonder the tears flowed by the bucketful.

At three o’clock (four o’clock eastern time), the time the funeral was to begin, I lit a candle for my dad, placed my little angels around the emanating light and sat a picture of my mother and father there and then I mourned. I was once again crying like a fire hydrant at full throttle. I was feeling all the pain that my family was enduring rush over me, as I looked at memorial pictures of my dad at the funeral parlor’s website.

Why am I not there? Why am I not grieving with my family? Why did nobody see to it that I was able to make the trip? I threw a pity party for myself and it felt okay, it felt like the right thing to do alone out in the middle of nowhere. The answers would come one day, but right now I just wanted to be alone to cry, to let the floodgates open and mourn.

Last night for some reason I wanted to watch It’s A Wonderful Life. I wanted to see Clarence, I wanted to see George, I wanted to see family and friends rally around him to make sure his Christmas would be a memorable one that made his life worth living. I wanted to see Clarence get his wings and leave George the message from beyond, “No man is a failure who has friends.”

It's a Wonderful Life

If it were not for my friends rallying around me to offer me comfort and support, the death of my father would be unbearable. I received a condolence card from a dear friend whom I’ve never met in person, yet she reached out, took her time out of her day to think of ME! Nothing touched me more than that moment of knowing, someone out there, cared for ME. My spiritual friends have been a welcome comfort where my blood family cast me aside and sent me out to sea.

After the movie ended I once again placed a call to my mother, not thinking she’d be home yet, so I’d leave a message reminding her to take her medicine. To my surprise she answered the phone and said she had just walked in the door. She went on to tell me how it was good seeing my father with no tubes in his nose, no mask on his face and not being hooked to wires. She felt a peaceful feeling knowing that she had family surrounding her during one of her darkest days. As we parted words I would go to bed in a sea of mixed emotions.

"Each man's life touches so many other lives, and when he isn't around he leaves an awful hole, doesn't he?" says the angel Clarence to George Bailey.

Quotation Saturday

A candle and rose for Eyrline Morgan

Pss. 48:14 For this God is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death.

DEATH

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien

“Life is for the living.
Death is for the dead.
Let life be like music.
And death a note unsaid.”
― Langston Hughes

“When he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.”
― William Shakespeare

“That was the thing. You never got used to it, the idea of someone being gone. Just when you think it's reconciled, accepted, someone points it out to you, and it just hits you all over again, that shocking.”
― Sarah Dessen

GRIEF

“So it’s true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri

“Tears shed for another person are not a sign of weakness. They are a sign of a pure heart.”
― José N. Harris

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
The deeper the grief, the closer is God!”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky

“God, but life is loneliness, despite all the opiates, despite the shrill tinsel gaiety of "parties" with no purpose, despite the false grinning faces we all wear. And when at last you find someone to whom you feel you can pour out your soul, you stop in shock at the words you utter - they are so rusty, so ugly, so meaningless and feeble from being kept in the small cramped dark inside you so long. Yes, there is joy, fulfillment and companionship - but the loneliness of the soul in its appalling self-consciousness is horrible and overpowering.”
― Sylvia Plath

MOURNING

“The only things I regret, and the only things I'll ever regret are things I didn't do. In the end, that's what we mourn. The paths we didn't take. The people we didn't touch.”
― Scott Spencer

“The size and height of the tree determines how heavily the ground will shake when it falls. The cassava tree falls and not even the pests in the forest are aware. The baobab tree falls and the whole forest looks empty! Such is human life!”
― Israelmore Ayivor

“Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.”
― Roland Barthes

“During the prayers of the day, there was one less “amen”.”
― Phindiwe Nkosi

My dear friend Eyrline Morgan passed away on January 16, 2015. After struggling through many illnesses she finally succumbed and went home to be with our Heavenly Father. The writing community (WVU, F2K) and the world look a lot dimmer today without her shining soul.

A post from Eyrline nine months ago in our Inspirational group:

A PRAYER
Be still my heart, God's in the sky. He has the answer To your cry = = = Be still, my heart.
Dear Lord,
Please give me strength, to find His way.
Please build me up from day to day,
That I might help someone to find His way,
 
Grant me the strength and courage, too,
To live a life, Sincere and true.

Rest in peace, E! We love you!