Remembering or Grief, you decide.

 In 2003 my brother died.  It was absolutely a shock.  He was 43 years old.  He had a hard life.  For every decision you have consequences.  The last 3 years of his life were some of the best since he was probably 14 years old.  He has 2 children who miss him so much.  He would be so proud of them. They were his greatest joy.  My parents have buried 2 children.  I think that is a lot to ask of a parent.  As siblings we miss them and the opportunities to be a family of 6 kids.  But on life goes.  We had his funeral.  Plans were made.  The viewing was hard.  My niece leaned in and seemed to memorizing his face.  They understood.  Grief is hard and a funny thing.  It always hurts but changes.  Life has a way of moving on regardless of how you feel.  

My Uncle wanted everyone to think he was tough and hard.  However he was one of the sweetest men I knew.  My dad says he learned to whisper in a saw mill.  My dad and him couldn't be more different.  He was trying to be supportive at the funeral.  He, like everyone else in the same situation really doesn't know what to say.  Trust me, I'm sorry this has happened, is a whole sentence and  honestly it's enough.  So my Uncle Lynn sat beside me at the funeral. I had a box of Kleenex at my feet.  He was very kind and brave, until.... this song came on...

https://youtu.be/HUj_BMYt5ak

Then he said Oh Shit and reached down and grabbed the box of Kleenex and put it on his lap.  Through my tears I chuckled.  To me that is the sweetest memory of the day.  So many people I hadn't seen since I grew up came to support our family.  It meant to world to all of us.  Trust me when I tell you don't let a day go by without telling someone you love them.  No one is promised a tomorrow.  NO ONE!

Then 2 days after his funeral my grandma died.  It wasn't unexpected but didn't hurt any less.  She was the last of that whole generation for me.  She had a wicked sense of humor.  I loved her so very much.  She is still missed every day.  Her funeral was such a mess.  People wouldn't work with us to make it the way we wanted.  So we had a graveside service with only close family.  Because of the mess with the pastor of her church.  (she had dementia so she hadn't been in a long while and this pastor didn't know her) we didn't have solid plans.  My cousin's and I started Amazing grace and everyone joined in.  It was beautiful and my grandma would have loved it.  Then my Uncle asked my dad to do the speaking.  He mentioned that the week before my dad had buried his son.  It took my dad a minute to get it back together.  He still remembers that to this day.  The funny memory from that day was at the time I always had sour lemon altoids on me. ALWAYS.  My oldest brother who smokes was sitting in front of my family.  I'm sure he really just wanted to smoke.  So when he heard my crinkling of paper without looking back he put his hand up.  I put two very sour lemon altoids in his hand.  He just popped them in his mouth.  He visibly shuddered!  I started to giggle.  He turned just enough to side eye me.  It was all I could do to not really laugh out loud.   

You know some times you have had all the sadness you can handle and just have to find joy where you can.  The  only thing to really do is just put one foot in front of the other.  I hope you remember to tell your family you love them.  They matter.  Even the ones you are not the closest to.  

I hope everyone in your world continues to be safe.  Peace. 

Growing Pains

 Do you remember when you were growing up and your legs would ache?  I do!  I remember laying in bed crying because my legs and knees hurt so badly.  I remember my dad rubbing my legs with his rough, working dad hands trying to make them feel better so I could sleep.  I don't remember growing fast or anything, just growing.  A few of our boys have done the same thing.  Just growing so that they ached.  As a mom my heart just broke for them.  It was so hard not having anything I could do more then children's Tylenol. I just wanted to make it stop for them. 

This past year has made me think of that a lot.  What a mess.   It feels a lot like growing pains.  People I thought were a part of my life forever have moved on.  I've had it happen before and I'm sure it will happen again.  But I don't like it.  It never doesn't hurt.   It makes a lot of old insecurities I have resurface. I had to leave it at "I am here if you decide something different".  But I hate it.  I'm leaning on my Savior and family and trying to just keep going.  One foot in front of the other.  The move to a small condo I thought was just for a small while has turned into a look that seems to be forever.  I keep telling myself that gratitude matters.  And I really am grateful. A life altering event/diagnoses for me. I'll be fine but it is a huge shock and does change some things.  But....     Then we get to Covid that has brought us all to a screeching halt. For the better part of a year only 2 of the 8 of us adults have worked.  Bugs has recently gone back.  But it's far from full time.  Everyone's plan's and goals are seemingly on hold.  It feels very strange.  The daily "faith over fear" mantra I do is even getting old to me.  I do worry about my parents and my Aunt.  They are all that's left of THAT generation.  I want us all do our part to keep them safe. I want to see them and hang out without fear!   However I really do want my guys to be able to go back to work.  We really do want our lives back.  Monkey is a Junior and REALLY wants to go to school.  He misses his friends. It's really not the same doing choir and chemistry on line.   His grades are not the same.  Not really confident of the whole online school thing.   I am sure we will get through this also, but again, we'd like some normalcy back.  

Yesterday we started having family dinners again.  Before we moved we used to have them every Sunday.  Only football games stopped one of the guys from being there.  He works for the stadium doing sound and before that was a season's ticket holder.  I have missed my family so very much this past year.  As much as possible we have complied with what was asked of us.   Soooo my very precious daughter in law expressed to me how much she was missing "us" also.  So we are going to start with once a month.  Yesterday was the first.  It was so lovely!  OH how lovely.   We laughed so much.  We really do enjoy each other.  As a mom one of the things we all want is our children to really love and care for each other.  Right?  Heir Apparent came to dinner after going to a funeral.  It was for a former co-worker and friend.  We had met her, she was so very kind and sweet.  She was 28 years old and died from cancer.  Leaving an 8 year old special needs son.  A horrible sad situation.  Watching Heir make eye contact with each and every one of his brothers and tell them that he loves them was almost more then I could take.   My children really do love each other.  We have been through a lot this past year, it's not over yet.  But in the end all we have is family.  And I love mine to the moon and back!  

I hope everyone in your world is safe.   Peace