Dodging the Bus

(The Approaching Bus [source])

Alli's angelversary struck yesterday.  For all who know the pain of an anniversary of a loved one's death, you'll get the visual.  You see it coming, the pain it will create, but there's not much you can do about it, kind of like a speeding bus heading your way.  You can brace yourself, try to dodge it, sleep all day, or whatever, but it will still come. 

[Timpanogos--Escaping to the outdoors [Source])

Every year, we escape because the last place we want to be on the angelversary is home.  Three years ago, we stayed in a cabin.  Two years ago, we went to Craters of the Moon.  Last year, we went to a bed and breakfast then tried (unsuccessfully) to hike up to Timpanogos Cave.  That was depressing.  This year, we just made a day trip of it to Lava Hot Springs.  My girl spent the whole time wanting to go home, and we all were somewhat disappointed.  At least we weren't home. 

[The true face of the bus: this memory of a tiny coffin in a big hole.]

Of course, the emotions still caught up.  It's the bus principle.  One way or another, they always do.  Last night, I shared pictures of her short life and broke down.  My husband has had the depression bus strike today.  It always catches up.  But staying busy helped me survive the day, helped us both survive the day.  And we got to make memories with those who remain.  Should we just stay home and let the bus hit or keep up the day trips?  In the end, whether things work out or not, I think it's worth it.  These days create memories and bonding we wouldn't otherwise have.  And our angels can join us, too.  I highly recommend it if you can.  It won't stop the bus, but it may just add a sense (perhaps false, but a sense, nonetheless) that you can control your grief.  You may want to try it sometime. 

Point of Connection

As of the 29th, it has been nine years since my baby slipped beyond the veil to God.  Most of the time, it's not hard to let the buffer of time hold the pain back.  It's not that time heals all wounds so much as time allows for distraction, for forgetfulness.  It allows me to hide from the feeling of the immediate, gut-wrenching pain of fresh loss.  

As I watch my nephews and niece and others around them deal with the fresh loss of their mother's departure beyond the veil, I feel those connections.  I can understand their pain--at least as we share the common connection of loss.  I will never understand exactly what they're going through, even were my mother to die, because I don't have their exact background or emotional constitution.  But I can reach out for an embrace, distancing myself from their pain to protect myself from having to dive into my own.  I imagine many of us do this.  We feel their particular pain through their lens from a safe distance.  As the memorial went on, even as they read an essay I wrote of their mother's loss, I clung to this protective barrier.  I hate funerals because they always want to drag me back to the whirlpool of my own exposed and naked pain.  But I hold back.  I keep the distance alive and well.  

Then, we come upon the month of her angelversary, and the distance starts to shrink.  Nine years feels a lot longer, somehow, than nine marks on the calendar, nine times I've had that scab peeled back as I stare into the bloody pulp, which is all that is left of my heart.  And suddenly, I start feeling the connection.  The distance means nothing.  The differences mean nothing.  Yes, our experiences are different, but the addresses of the pain are next door to each other.  At these times, it's as if nine years never happened, and it feels like fresh loss again.  We can embrace as one, pray for healing as one, as we experience the healing power of understanding and love.  The Lord will see us through.  He knows where our loved ones are, that they are happy and continue to love us.  He will hold them in his love until we can meet them again. 

Homicide too Close to Home

A week and a half ago, a little girl named Lizzy Shelley disappeared from a house across the street from my boy's school.  You probably heard of it.  It's been international news.  It was all over FaceBook first because something like this rarely happens this close to home, and my neighbors and friends really felt it.  Police suspected her uncle, and a short time later, he led officials to her body to avoid the death penalty.  The broken and bloody knife had already been found in the parking lot of my boy's charter school, where he's been since kindergarten.  Her body was found a very short distance from that same school. 

[source]

This case hits home for many reasons.  The first is geography.  I've been in that quiet neighborhood more times than I can count, have left my kids alone there.  It never seemed like the kind of place a little girl could be kidnapped and murdered. 

[source]

Another is, obviously, I am mother to an angel.  I lost my daughter under very different circumstances, but people who lose their children often understand each other on a level that those who have not lost a child can't.  As I say, it's great to have the empathy that comes with knowing what it's like to lose a child, but we don't wish our club on anyone because the dues are way too high. .  I can only imagine what kind of pain, devastation, and, of course, guilt this family is feeling not because they did anything wrong but because that's the human response.  If you can take responsibility, you can take control, which means you HAVE control and can prevent this kind of pain in the future.  It's illogical.  Things like this happen, and we don't have control.  But, at that point, you'll do anything mentally or physically to try to feel better. 

[source]

The third reason reason this hits close to home is we had to send my brother to prison for pedophilia.  He died of major medical complications right there in prison the month before my daughter passed away.  2010 was a monstrous year for us.  But this is the very thing we were afraid could happen if we let my brother stay in my parents' basement where grandkids could come and go, where there was an elementary a couple of blocks away.  One doesn't always get the kind of warning we did--finding pictures on my parents' computer--or know that 89% of pedophiles act out.  One can't always tell just by looking at your brother that he's dangerous. 

In all ways it's possible, this case hits closer to home than it does to most.  We don't know the family, but we feel their pain.  We don't know the brother, but we've seen shadows of that darkness in my own family.  We've never walked in that house, but some good friends of ours where we have walked live right next door.  It's a chilling thing when an event like this strikes so close to home.  I pray for that family, and I pray that no family has to undergo what this family has suffered.