Every time I sweep I think of my Grandma saying “Don’t sweep my feet or else I’ll never get married” each time I swept her workspace at our family business. It was a superstition of hers. She said it every single time anyone was sweeping, without fail. She never worried if it got old or lost its punch. She was married and had been most of her life to my Grandpa. I miss him so much and it’s difficult to believe that he has been gone almost 17 years. It just doesn’t seem I could have lived all of this time without him being near but here we are. Talking with a niece recently about a loved aunt who passed away she told me that she imagined our aunt with all of her friends who were also gone, sipping wine, reading on the beach and enjoying their favorite pleasures. She joked that her warped Catholic view of the afterlife made her feel better about missing our aunt. Atleast she has a vision of the afterlife. I thought and joked to her “I have to work on my warped view of the afterlife” but no matter how I try I can’t make anything of it. I miss those people who are gone. All of the life events that pass, I wonder how this could be going on, day after day and year after year, without them. It’s not possible that they could be absent from these meaningful moments. My daughter says she isn’t afraid of dying but is afraid of losing all of the memories of this lifetime that mean so much to her. We are here for a tiny flash in the scheme of time but we are so attached to this life. A man on PBS talking about mother’s day today said “Dinosaurs were mothering their offsprings 65 million years ago.” How can the scrapbooks and memories of each one of our lives stack up to that? I remember a good friend who was losing a battle for his life saying that he was ok with dying but didn’t want to miss everyone. It breaks my heart and yet it’s a part of life that is as normal as the sun rising and setting each and every day. What I got most from my niece’s conversation about those who have passed was a loud and clear reminder: Appreciate the joys and the highs, count bleasings. -smilingbug
smilingbug 