As Time goes by

As time rolls by, I continue to experience sorrow and despair at times. I continue to cry over my son. It is a daily ritual. However, I admit that intervals of pain are much shorter and less frequent. I learned to live again rather than just to exist. I learned to appreciate every breath that I take. I learned to see beauty in everything. I learned to care for others. I learned to live in the present and not the past or the future. 

Why do I Continue to Garden?

Why Do I Continue to Garden?
After losing my son David, I almost died from the pain ad sorrow. One way that I dealt with the loss was to create gardens which kept me sane. There is a healing aspect to gardening. I surround myself with beauty which dissipates some of the pain. Try it. It works.

Why do I garden?

When David died I went crazy and cried without stopping. I wailed and yelled and would not be consoled. Everything was dark and there was no hope to go on. When I was in deep despair I would go out for a walk or try to garden. I designed a new garden and named it “David’s Garden”.  I would dig in the dirt and just get lost in the beauty of nature. Gardening connected me to God and to my son. Flowers dissipated the gloom within my soul and brought sudden joy through my downcast spirit. They put on a glow of many colors, all dressed in beauty and wonder. The air was all perfume from their scent. People walk by and admire the garden and I get to talk to them about my son. 

Forever in my heart

Although David left us, my world continues to be luminous long after he has been out of sight. He cannot die out of my world. He has left much of himself behind. As long as I love, I will feel him and see him everywhere even though he is nowhere.

Everywhere I go I am surrounded and am reminded of him.  When I look at the sky he is there. When I hear a bird sing he is there. When I see the stars he is there. When I hear a song he is there. When I see the flowers he is there. When I see a butterfly he is there. Beautiful things remind me of him as he is beautiful. No matter what I do or where I go he is there. He continues to be an integral part of my being and forever will be in my heart. 

Have a nice Day

After I purchase something or end a phone conversation I hear the words “Have a nice day”. Many assume that every day is a nice day.

Such a common saying, given by so many people who do not know the pain that I am enduring, brings tears to my eyes. Can’t you see? Don’t you know that I lost my son? Are you blind? How can I have a nice day?

Why is it that every statement has a new meaning now? An ordinary statement that I heard many times before and that made me thank the person who spoke it, now sets me off. Grief hits me so suddenly and there is no grief like this grief. All the pain and uncertainty are ignited with an ordinary statement.

A nice day is a day that includes my son. It was a day when my world lit up as I looked at his beautiful face and heard him call me “mom’. Before he died a nice day was a day when the sun shone, the flowers bloomed, the birds sang and the breeze rustled softly through the trees.  Beautiful things of the world now are so painful because David cannot share them with me. I hope that one day I can contemplate beauty again.

Cape Cod Flowers