We did a lot today...it may not seem like a lot but it was to us. Eric and I drove Emily in to Seattle U today and the three of us removed two bookcases from Chris' former office, the last things of his things left there. It is no longer his office, I am no longer a faculty spouse, Emily and I are students there and Eric will be in time but there is no longer an office there that is his...that is ours. My kids napped on that floor as Chris and I would eat lunch some days. Eric played in that floor when I was in class a few years back, Emily retreated to it most of her freshman year between classes. They knew where the snacks were, they knew it was a mess in there but it was his and it was special. So that was the first thing we did today...we took what is ours and said goodbye to what is not.
The second thing we did was go to Kentridge, school starts for Eric tomorrow, he's a freshman. We walked through his schedule, from one end of campus to another and we met the new band teacher.
Life moves forward and God continues to teach us how to be in relationship with Him and one another in this new life of ours. And life is good, although different. Tomorrow morning my son gets on the bus to go to high school. It feels like yesterday that he slept in Chris' office floor during our lunches as just a baby but tomorrow my baby is in high school.
And I have learned that the most valuable tool of motherhood is the power of prayer so that's what I do. I stay in relationship, talking to, whining to, yelling at and praising the One who loves my babies and me more that I have ever even imagined loving. I'm nervous a bit about this year, it's new and different but I'm also excited. We are three people with the world at our feet, both individually and as a family. The Great Mystery will continue to guide us through the story of our lives and we're ready.
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Today
Eric in front of a 1959 Corvette at the Lemay Car Show. We had beautiful weather here in Seattle as we celebrated and remembered Chris on his birthday. We looked at so many cars and I kept hearing Chris' words about them all, he knew SO MUCH about old cars and greatly appreciated them. It was another Godly timed moment for the Lemay show to happen exactly on his birthday.
Friday, August 27, 2010
August 28th
Tomorrow we celebrate Chris' birthday, August 28, 1963. He would be 47. This year his birthday is more for us than for him. Scripture teaches that time doesn't really exist in heaven and that a day is like a thousand years. I truly rejoice with him that he is fully in the Presence and knowing a peace and blissful grace that I can only touch on and imagine. Tomorrow I will remember all the birthdays we shared together. With the exception of his 45th birthday, which he had while in Ghana, we shared every birthday from his 22nd until tomorrow, 23 of them in all. He never once failed to praise my baking or not be abundantly grateful for even the simplest of gifts.
So, tomorrow morning about nine in the morning the kids and I will head to the Lemay Car Show, a yearly pilgrimage of Chris and Eric's and of mine last year. We will stop by the post office to drop his birthday present in the mail, a gift to Women's Enterprises. We'll get dinner out and have cake. August 28th will forever be etched in my heart as a special day. Happy birthday sweetie!
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
So, tomorrow morning about nine in the morning the kids and I will head to the Lemay Car Show, a yearly pilgrimage of Chris and Eric's and of mine last year. We will stop by the post office to drop his birthday present in the mail, a gift to Women's Enterprises. We'll get dinner out and have cake. August 28th will forever be etched in my heart as a special day. Happy birthday sweetie!
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Hanging in here...
Two tonsils down, two to go!! Emily is in summer school, studying Ethics, and next in line for surgery. Then on to a fall free of sore throats theoretically. She's going to double major, English is being joined by Philosophy. And in great surprise Eric announced he is leaning more toward SU than Gonzaga. Could it be mom back in grad school there this fall and his sister loving it there is swaying him?? The family that studies together???
Do we sound semi normal?? We're finding our feet and the blur of the first couple of months is a little better. Still we face Chris' birthday on the 28th, but we face it together. He would want my chocolate cake so we're going to have one. He would go to the car show, so we're going. He would want gifts to go to Women's Enterprises, so that's where they will go.
We're still here. Hanging in here together, holding tight to one another, each comforted by two people who GET it. Still missing, still teary, still remembering...but Chris LIVED and he lived intentionally and authentically so that's the best way to honor him. And to trust in and surrender to a Loving God who takes perfect care of him today. It's comforting to be able to talk to him at times and say, "Hey I'm still looking through that mirror dimly thing, so be patient with me." Hard as it is to feel his absence, I really AM rejoicing in his being truly Home.
And so we trudge on, going back to school...all three of us. Normal?? A new one. Thanks be to the Loving God who really CAN just get you through anything. Trust that...I'm POSITIVE.
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Do we sound semi normal?? We're finding our feet and the blur of the first couple of months is a little better. Still we face Chris' birthday on the 28th, but we face it together. He would want my chocolate cake so we're going to have one. He would go to the car show, so we're going. He would want gifts to go to Women's Enterprises, so that's where they will go.
We're still here. Hanging in here together, holding tight to one another, each comforted by two people who GET it. Still missing, still teary, still remembering...but Chris LIVED and he lived intentionally and authentically so that's the best way to honor him. And to trust in and surrender to a Loving God who takes perfect care of him today. It's comforting to be able to talk to him at times and say, "Hey I'm still looking through that mirror dimly thing, so be patient with me." Hard as it is to feel his absence, I really AM rejoicing in his being truly Home.
And so we trudge on, going back to school...all three of us. Normal?? A new one. Thanks be to the Loving God who really CAN just get you through anything. Trust that...I'm POSITIVE.
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Why
On January 12th of this year our family drove to Swedish for Chris to have the first surgery in a plan that would have him on maintenance chemo and cancer free by the end of April. Obviously it didn't work out according to our or our doctors' plan.
On January 12th of this year 200,000 Haitians died in a 7.0 earthquake that ravaged their country. 2,000,000 were left homeless.
On January 12th God was holding a family in Seattle. On January 12th God was holding families in Haiti. God holds, loves and carries every day and every single day someone is having a January 12th or, in our case, a March 4th. One of the consistent questions I get emailed, asked in the store, on the phone, even at church...is this..."How can you still have faith that God is there, that God is good, that God really does love you?"
My trite answer when I am tired is "bad things happen to good people." My theologically thought out answer is that scripture is filled with examples of people whose lives were ripped apart from the human viewpoint and God rebuilt them and is invested in who we all are as people. The answer that resounds loudly in my heart is simply that I feel Him. I feel Him when I sing hymns, when I work in my garden, when I sit up late at night with sick kids. I feel Him. It's really that simple. And yes I have those same questions..."but why do You let this happen or that happen?" I get frustrated with Him, I don't understand Him, I can think of no other way to describe this God than He is a Great Mysterious Lover of my soul. And yet I feel Him.
I see through a mirror dimly, but I am in good company. St. Paul saw through that same mirror, as did Moses and Jeremiah and my own Aunt Dorothy and Grandmother Bowles and Grandmother Sell and now they all see clearly and I will too one day. Chris was an encourager to me, he was that person who always was in my ear saying I could do it and to try. I feel that even more so now, he sees clearly. Scripture is filled with examples of God at work, of lives forever changed, of a people who see dimly and then SEE and I firmly believe we are not only readers of that story but a part of it.
I don't know why Chris died at 46. I don't know why the surgery plan blew up in our faces so badly. I don't know why there are hundreds of thousands of children orphaned in Haiti. I don't know why things have happened in Darfur. All I know is that God is God and I am not. And I FEEL Him.
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
On January 12th of this year 200,000 Haitians died in a 7.0 earthquake that ravaged their country. 2,000,000 were left homeless.
On January 12th God was holding a family in Seattle. On January 12th God was holding families in Haiti. God holds, loves and carries every day and every single day someone is having a January 12th or, in our case, a March 4th. One of the consistent questions I get emailed, asked in the store, on the phone, even at church...is this..."How can you still have faith that God is there, that God is good, that God really does love you?"
My trite answer when I am tired is "bad things happen to good people." My theologically thought out answer is that scripture is filled with examples of people whose lives were ripped apart from the human viewpoint and God rebuilt them and is invested in who we all are as people. The answer that resounds loudly in my heart is simply that I feel Him. I feel Him when I sing hymns, when I work in my garden, when I sit up late at night with sick kids. I feel Him. It's really that simple. And yes I have those same questions..."but why do You let this happen or that happen?" I get frustrated with Him, I don't understand Him, I can think of no other way to describe this God than He is a Great Mysterious Lover of my soul. And yet I feel Him.
I see through a mirror dimly, but I am in good company. St. Paul saw through that same mirror, as did Moses and Jeremiah and my own Aunt Dorothy and Grandmother Bowles and Grandmother Sell and now they all see clearly and I will too one day. Chris was an encourager to me, he was that person who always was in my ear saying I could do it and to try. I feel that even more so now, he sees clearly. Scripture is filled with examples of God at work, of lives forever changed, of a people who see dimly and then SEE and I firmly believe we are not only readers of that story but a part of it.
I don't know why Chris died at 46. I don't know why the surgery plan blew up in our faces so badly. I don't know why there are hundreds of thousands of children orphaned in Haiti. I don't know why things have happened in Darfur. All I know is that God is God and I am not. And I FEEL Him.
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Remembering...
It was five months last Wednesday. I spent the morning in the hospital with Eric, having his tonsils out. I spent the afternoon with him groggy, hurting and on narcotics. I spent the whole day thinking this is something the Mom should do WITH the Dad. And yet we felt his presence, one of the heavenly hosts of saints and I know we are held by our Loving God who has carried us through the last five months. Today, I'm back at the same surgeon's office, scheduling Emily's tonsil surgery. Remembering and missing are part of life now...
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
Grace for your journey,
Leigh
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