The Remembering
105 years ago today, my great uncle was born to parents who went on to have thirteen children.
I have a lot of words and thoughts and feelings about my childhood, my lineage. A good deal of those I spent a good amount of money, time, and energy in a therapist’s office unwinding and finding healing from…
But where there is pain or trauma, let me tell you, there are always bright spots. Hope is resilient in humans. I don’t understand how, but trust me, it is on my list for God to address. {I have questions. 🙋🏻♀️}
Some of the best and shiniest memories I have from my childhood and my adulthood, are wrapped up in this man. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of him. He loved me so well…so unconditionally. I have reminders of him all around my spaces - in photos, things he made for me, a framed scrap piece of paper of the scorecard from one of our many games of dominoes, and in recordings I made of him telling me stories.
With every passing year since his death, I don’t know how, but I miss him even more - not less.
This morning, as I sat down with my first cup of coffee, I saw four deer 🦌 running through the woods not twenty feet from me, jumping over the creek one by one with the third of the four being a baby. I have never seen that many here that close to the cottage. It was breathtaking, and I might have squealed, but then I teared up. 🥹 It has been a difficult week for my heart and missing people I love, and it just felt a little like God saying, “I love you. It’s all going to be okay. Look at this beauty. At this LIFE before you, outside your window. That new little life.”
Grief is…well, it is the absolute sh*t. Physically, it looks like smiling and crying simultaneously with the most dumbfounding look on your face. Just me?
It is in the remembering…and the feeling of those memories…that those we love live on.
Happy Birthday Uncle Odale!
I love and miss you so much. I hope (especially today) you are playing dominoes, driving fast, and having something sweet to eat. ❤️
