North of Town

my brother's headstone


my grandparents markers are behind this stone



from the gravel road just west of the cemetery



Today was a great and happy day, my nephew Levi graduated from DCHS. I lived with my sister the summer of 1991 to be his babysitter. He was such a cutie pie then, and he still is, just much taller.

I stopped at our family graves on the way home. It had been a few years and I just needed to be there a moment. We don't make it to C o k a t o very often, and usually we are heading back home in the dark. It always pains me to see the plots with black dirt, or new grass, thinking of a family's loss and pain. There was another woman visiting the cemetery when I arrived--I couldn't see well enough to tell whether hers was a familiar face, but I felt like I should know her. As I was driving out, I noticed this marker of my sister's friend. A place for her family to remember her...obviously well tended. Lovely.
I cried when I reached my brother's grave. I was 6 when he died. I remember feeling bad that I didn't cry at his funeral. It took my Mom years to be able to talk about Jimmy, and we just don't discuss the details of his death. I won't here. I think about him often. When Theo was about 4 months old something about his nose reminded me of his uncle Jimmy. This made me very happy. Today my tears surprised me, and it was the kind of cry that starts with a lump in your throat. Becoming a mother really changes perspective, and I think some of the sorrow I felt today was for Mom, and her loss, since now I know how dear and deeply a mother loves her child.

Last year an old friend of Mom's lost her son, you may have known Betty H's boy was 22. In May Mom was able to visit with Betty for the first time since her son's passing (she was in town for another son's wedding :). It was a short conversation, but they were alone in a quiet room at church. It must have been good to talk to someone who understands that kind of loss and pain. That both son's were 22 when they left their Mamas... Well, it has been so difficult for my mom to process her grief, because it is so deep and raw. I think there was some peace for her--to share a few moments with a woman Mom has long admired, who has shown kindness (when often others have been distant), who has known this pain--in finally moving with her grief. I hope.

Yesterday my pedicure client mentioned a website she has for parents grieving a child. I meant to write it down, maybe to share with Mom if she'd be open to it. One thing Client mentioned from her web page is that people will ask about the circumstances of the death, and that it is usually really an awful question for the parent. She says that parents want to remember their child's life, and share happy memories. I wonder if it goes the same way for people who have lost parents? My Mom just had an experience with someone who said, "Aren't you the one who's son ...?" Mom said, "I don't like to talk about that now." He didn't stop. She felt horrid. People are total idiots sometimes. I like to remember my brother as the guy who gave his baby sister a can of oil for Christmas. She cried when she unwrapped that gift. Bawled. He quickly opened it, revealing the can was full of candy. All for her. Sweet memory.