Lessons Learned When We Let Go

It’s hard to believe it’s been 20 years to the day that we held my mother’s funeral. I can truly say that I have no earthly idea where the time has flown. My days since that day have been filled with many joyful events, great occasions, exciting adventures, and some important lessons learned, despite my best efforts not to have to learn anything else, ha.

For those who knew how close my Mom and I were all of our lives, it stumped a few of my dear friends how I could be so seemingly calm and moving forward without grand remorse or grief or periods of depression that come so very naturally to anyone who sustains a loss. As those who knew my Mom would know, however, she had a plan for that time, and she devised a good one. It came with a great deal of thought, planning, and a laundry list a mile long of things I was to do instead of grieve. Mama always had a plan and that’s saying something when her daughter was built to challenge even the most patient and saintly among women.

My mother had the early life experience of losing someone she dearly loved to World War II. He had been her true kindred spirit, soulmate, and yet…he didn’t return from the war and her life made its first change in plans as she built a future without him. Years later she would meet and marry my dad, and for eight years that worked just fine. Eventually that went the way of past tense and she and I built a new life, one without regret, but not without hardship.

Through every obstacle, challenge, and hardship, never once did I hear her complain. She only showed me the power of prayer, over and over again. It wasn’t something overt and showy…it was silent and reverent and results-getting. I started following suit. Direct prayer and watching what happened afterwards was a lesson in itself. When I say things were tough, believe me, they were. Imagine the 1960s where women couldn’t have a credit card in their name, when it was next to impossible to get credit for a purchase, just layaway existed for those without ready cash.

How she managed to put me through Keystone on a secretary’s salary, I later calculated should have been impossible…but then you’d have to know Mama. So many sacrifices she made and never once did she announce or reveal them. My education meant the world to her as she never got to finish college. She had to help keep the family going during her young adult years as the country was indeed in the middle of war.

Her heart was amazing for her family—she would do anything for them even when they might not have ever thought of her as anything other than “the strong one.” Her example left me an amazing playbook to follow for my life. I often fail miserably but when I do it turns out I’ve turned inward for intelligence rather than seeking the wisdom of the Lord to move forward.

I’m catching on, some 20 years later. One of her favorite expressions was “You can’t outgive God,” although I swear to you she seemed to be able to do just that. She cared so much for everyone and she was insistent I be an active participant in her caregiving. Often, I was her appointed agent for do-gooding and believe me I wasn’t always a cheerful giver.

For example, the time where I was scrambling to get all her meds, foods, and supplies in for her so that I could be gone for a two-day consulting project out of state. I’d been near collapse finishing my checklist and then she announces to me that I needed to go and vacuum our next-door neighbor’s floor for her, because she wasn’t up to it and it would make her feel better (the neighbor).

My protestation that the lady had an adult son living there for whom she cooked three meals a day who could vacuum for her fell on deaf ears. I went over and vacuumed, to the appreciation of my neighbor, who reciprocated in kindness for years and years, traveling to see Mom when we moved away from next door, and calling her daily on the phone, another lifeline. Mama was right. Even after Mom died, the neighbor would call me to tell me that when they sang “Amazing Grace” in church that morning, she thought of Mom, was such a welcome gift.

I was frequently in shock as to where she thought I might come up with the free time that she thought up for me to do this or that. Still, she persisted, and I chose not to buck her. I trusted her and loved her is why. Plus she was charming and funny and witty and you couldn’t help but agree with her. Most of the time.

When Mom passed she had been able to live with me for all but the last three months of her life and the folks who cared for her at the nursing facility saw me three times a day/night/overnight. I knew all the shifts of those who cared for and about her and the staff were all precious. I had been able to prepare for Mom’s final days here with me, thanks to a big sister friend who had sitters for her parents, and I was able to secure the services of many of those same angels and they were amazing. It was not easy but we all created a happy and pleasant working environment with Mama being priority one. The sitters were family to us, not sitters and they filled the pews at church when she passed.

The choir was amazing, the choir director, also a deacon, gave a beautiful message, and over three pews were filled with the family members of my big sister friend, who’d gifted me with her family to share time with for 22 years. Longtime friends filled the other pews and I felt humbled and lucky to receive their support, kindness, and love. I never once felt alone. Time passed and the family I'd been able to share time with was growing, and relationships took different directions, and it became time for me to fly solo, but the love there remained unchanged.

In the past 12 years since, life has been nothing short of amazing. When you have been anchored in faith all of your life, and you’re admonished by your mother never to doubt in the power of God, everything else just seems to fall into place.

It has been anything but easy. I have numerous regrets but I don’t allow them time in my head. I note them and move on, lest I torque Mom off for wasting precious time on Earth. I was admonished to stay away from her gravesite as “I’m not there so don’t go out there thinking you are going to find me for a chat.” Instead, I was to think of her with flowers on my table and talk to the bouquet instead. Flowers continue to find their way to my table, courtesy of precious neighbors and friends who just seem to know when I need them.

Twenty years is the blink of an eye. In 20 more it will be 40 years since that time, and then what? I can’t wait to see what life will be like then, and even later beyond. I’d love to live to age 100 and see what technology has to offer us. iPhone 68 perhaps? We’ll see.

In the meantime, Memorial Day is on its way, and we remember those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our country…we have celebrations in their honor and memory and we wear a buddy poppy, Mom’s favorite, in their memory.

To love someone truly means to be able to let go and give them back to Heaven when the time comes. It’s not in my time, or yours, but as my friend Marcia often reminds me, it’s in “God’s own perfect time” and it is always the right time.

One of the reasons I became a Life Celebrant and Tribute Writer is to help people tell their stories of what life was like while they were here. What and who was important to them and key in their lives in helping them to accomplish their goals and achieve their dreams. Hard work, dedication and devotion are all that are required. The rest is just a matter of prayer, and time. It’s not all that I do, not by a long shot, but it is one of the things that I do in the course of my life today. And it is an honor and a privilege.

Go call someone you love and tell them you were just thinking of them. It will bring a smile to you both. “Let go, and let God.” Mama said so. P.S. Of the many gifts that Mom gave me, one was an oil painting of Cher that she did for me because she knew what Cher meant to me as I was a teenager growing up. It just so happens that today is also Cher's birthday, and she is currently celebrating her 79th birthday, with gusto no doubt. It's why I still love her. She defies age and defines life at its fullest. I adored calling Mom my "inhouse artist." You wouldn't believe what else she painted for me. That will be for another time and post.

Marking a Memorable Day and Remembering a Loved One

It was a beautiful sunny afternoon as I was leaving Callaway-Jones, headed into the back parking lot last Thursday, when I spotted something you don’t see every day here. A rooster and a hen were strutting down a nearby driveway, headed home after a visit to one of the neighbors’ lawns to search for who knows what. I just stared at them, amused, thinking that they didn’t think anything about what I was thinking. They were on a mission of their own and heading home afterwards. Country living in the middle of a city. I guess that’s what you call mixed-use development.

My eyes then moved right as I saw a delivery truck backed up and ready to offload. The truck’s logo bore the name of a well-known casket manufacturer of whom I’d been aware for close to 15 years now, today being 14 years to the day of my mother’s passing. The year before her death, my best friend and I had driven to two manufacturers’ sites in Texas, while I was studying the pricing, quality, and elements of exactly the kind of casket I wanted for Mom’s burial. As a good nerd, research is always comforting. Understand the unknown and it can’t flummox you later.

When you think about these topics early, it takes much of the emotion, grief, and trauma out of the equation. I wanted time to think about what I’d like, what I could afford, and what was available. As an only child, all decisions were up to me. Don’t feel sorry for me, because I had no one telling me I was “doing it wrong,” ha.

By the time my research and review of caskets was done, I knew the top manufacturers’ names, the model names of many caskets, the difference between various metal gauges, and other terms that don’t come up often in daily conversation. And I knew the pricing. When it came time to select Mom’s casket, I was well prepared and trusted Cody and his grandfather, Raymond, to make sure the casket of my choice would arrive on time. They did, precisely. It was exactly what I wanted for Mom, and it was beautiful. And then I forgot about all that, for 14 years in fact.

As some of you know, I now work for Callaway-Jones as their Certified Life Celebrant and Life Tribute Writer, so you think I’d be thinking a lot about caskets, but in fact I don’t. I think about life after death, about celebrating the life that meant so much to those they left behind, and on constructing services that provide healing and celebration of the best times of their lives. But Thursday afternoon was different.

As I stood there actually seeing the delivery truck back into position, time froze for a few minutes as I just watched something profound happen. I’ve known my friend and work colleague Catherine Ewing-Cates for over 20 years, and I know she’s been a Funeral Director for many years. But most recently I have thought of her as the manager of Restever Cemetery in Bryan, because that’s where I see her often.

But Thursday, Catherine was outside in the parking lot standing quietly until the driver had opened the bay of his truck and she moved forward with the carrier that the casket would be offloaded to. She greeted the driver respectfully and professionally, and there was no idle chatter. Both driver and funeral director offloaded the casket and transferred it onto the carrier with such respectfulness, that it reminded me exactly of the scene I’d seen many times on “NCIS,” when a military serviceperson is flown home to the United States and military personnel await the transfer of the casket. There’s a quiet reverence about that process. And yes, I've been known to shed a tear at the beauty of the ceremony because of what it means.

And Thursday, there was a similar stillness and solitude in that scene. In fact, neither Catherine nor the driver even noticed me watching them. They were doing their jobs so professionally, even when no one was (seemingly) watching. There was a beautiful cover over the casket, for protection during the drive, and yet another layer of secure covering after the cover was removed. Catherine handled that transfer with exactly the same level of respect as she would have, were there someone inside it. That just hit me as profound. It’s the parts of the world we work in that the public doesn’t see that are even more impressive than all the things you do see that cause you to have confidence in us.

Yes, it’s how we make you feel after losing a loved one that you remember most of all, but I really wanted to say that, even though I’ve seen many aspects of afterlife care that most of you have not, I’m really proud of the family team I work with, because I see what you can’t, and don’t, and it is truly as worthy of lifting up. Yet, there’s no standing ovation for honor and grace, although there really should be. At the end of the day, you can know you’ve done your job well, and served your families with total respect and appreciation because of all who see you doing that, but it’s who we are when no one is watching that I think is worth just as much merit.

I just took a few minutes again this afternoon to vote in The Eagle’s Reader’s Choice Awards 2019 contest. You can vote once a day through tomorrow. I’m proud that Callaway-Jones is in the Top 3 as best funeral home and that two of the Top 3 best funeral directors are ours, as well as one of the Top 3 receptionists in the competition. I may be biased because I work there, but I only work there because many years ago, I was their customer first. And my confidence in them has only become stronger with every day I interact with them.

I do so love “country living” in the middle of Bryan, Texas. I’ve got deer in my front yard looking for supper and a rooster and a hen strutting up and down driveways and parking lots out for a walk. It just doesn’t get any better than this. As we begin to prepare for Memorial Day weekend ahead next weekend, we remember and appreciate all the professionals whose work involves paying respects to those we’ve loved and lost. Their memories, and their love, remain with us forever.