Of Snowflakes and Diamonds

***SIGH***

Death………I’ve wanted...or rather needed (nobody ever really WANTS to talk about it) to talk about this for a few days now and just didn’t know how to start it. It’s not an easy topic and quite frankly it’s going to be a long, 5 Kleenex blog entry, for both you AND me. However, I think it needs to be recorded for posterity and not just left to scatter to the wind and be forgotten. Also, the other reason for my delay in writing this is because I know Lori will be reading this at some point and I don’t want to cause more pain where there is already so much right now. So Lori, when you see this…it’s ok if you stop here, I won’t take it personally.

We understand death for the first time when he puts his hand upon one whom we love. ~Madame de Stael

My first real encounter with the loss of a loved one came in 1999. Now I had lost several relatives before then, but they were relatives that I wasn’t close to, so at the risk of sounding callous, although I truly was sad when they passed, I just never ached that they were gone. My grandmother however, that was a different story. She was ill for quite a while and to see her degrade from the strong woman she once was, to a frail shell of her former self, was difficult. I had taken some leaves of abscence to go down for extended periods of time and care for her before she had to be moved to a nursing home, which I think helped prepare me to lose her...as much as you can be anyway. My mother kept in constant contact with the nursing home…we couldn’t visit because we lived here in Connecticut and she was so far away in Alabama. The nurses kept my mom included in every detail and would give her status updates as often as possible which also helped. I remember though the night that we lost her…..I had a dream that night that I will never forget….one that I have shared some details with people about over the years, but this will be the first time I have EVER shared the entire thing with ANYONE....including my mother and Ben. I guess by keeping most of it to myself it was sort of like clinging onto my own personal goodbye and so I selfishly guarded it. Seeing one of my closest friends though going through such a painful loss has made me finally want to share the whole thing ...Who knows, maybe it will be encouraging to somebody out there someday.....you never know.

In my dream I was walking in a large green grassy field beside a mountain. The sky was a rich bright blue, and the stone of the mountain was bright golden brown rock. As I walked I looked up and saw a grass covered hill extending from the mountain far into the field to my right. On top of this hill was a massive and beautiful tree, lush, full of leaves, and bathed in bright sunlight. I felt drawn to it and began walking towards it. The branches were full of emerald green leaves and I remember the branches rustling as wind whipped down the side of the mountain. As I got closer the color of the leaves began to change from emerald green to a warm golden orange and they began flying off of the tree with every gust of wind until only a few remained. I remember thinking that the whole scene looked like a Maxfield Parrish painting.

As I climbed the hill to the base of the tree I knew I was coming to the end of something…..I just didn’t know what yet. It was then that I heard a voice in the dream recite to me, “ Now a little before them stood an oak; and under it, when they came to it, they found an old pilgrim, fast asleep…..” I looked up at the branches of the tree above me and heard the same voice say, “When the last leaf falls she’ll be gone.” I remember feeling very sad and closing my eyes hoping that would stop the leaves from falling. When I opened them again I was laying down on the ground looking at the branches like a child lays in the grass and watches clouds go by. I watched leaf after leaf pop off in the wind and flutter and fly away until there was only one left amid the dark bark and branches. Then suddenly I saw that one wiggle and pop off, but instead of flying off and away it literally floated down slowly and as it got closer to my eyes I heard the voice again, “ ….yet if the sun of righteousness will arise upon him, his frozen heart shall feel a thaw; and thus it hath been with me.” At the last word, the leaf dropped onto my eyes and everything went black.

I remember sobbing in my sleep and waking up to the sound of the phone ringing, my mother picking it up, and hearing her crying as the nurses told her my grandmother was gone.

I found out later that the quotes I had heard in my dream were from Pilgrim’s Progress…a book I had never read before then. It’s been almost 10 years since I had that dream and yet the tears are streaming down my face as I remember it. As time passes, the pain of losing someone may not be felt as often or as deeply as it was in the beginning, but to some degree it will always be there. Now due to my faith I have a lot of peace about certain things pertaining to death, and I have that with my grandmother....but the physical side of life....that's where the hurt is. The fact that we can't hear their laugh, we can't see their smiles, we can't complain about all those little irritants that used to drive us nuts about them...or call on them when we're hurting and feel their comfort. **sigh** therein lies the pain.

A few weeks ago Lori's mom was suddenly and quite unexpectedly diagnosed with inoperable cancer. It was a shocking blow. This woman who had never been sick a day in her life was suddenly struck down....blindsided. The biggest blessing I have seen so far is that where a strained and painful relationship once existed beteen Lori and her mom, there is now tenderness and affection. Where there was hurt and fear of rejection there is now love and acceptance.

Tuesday night I went with Lori to the hospice her mother had been taken to so we could spend some quality time with her. As we tried to make the best of a sorrowful thing we heard the story of the young woman in the bed next to Lori’s mom. Only six short months ago this 42 year old woman had been the life of the party, well loved by all and living to the fullest. Then she was diagnosed with breast cancer. They had gone in to remove it only to find that it had metastised and there was nothing that could be done. She now lay in a deeply medicated sleep unable to acknowledge or respond to anyone or anything around her. Just hours before we had arrived, her boyfriend, a huge burly biker type, had come to visit his love. Apparently at some point after her diagnosis this once vibrant woman had suffered the fear that he would leave her because of her illness. A fear that I'm sure many people feel when confronted with an illness of this magnitude. Well, that day, quietly, as the other patients in the room and their families sat visiting their own loved ones, he had come in with a group of their friends and family. Amid a sea of emotions he took out an engagement ring, lifted her limp arm and slipped it onto her finger and proposed. As he broke down in body shaking sobs he managed to get the words out, "I promised you I would never leave you...no matter what." his other big burly friends who all looked like they should be bouncers in biker bars all let down their guard and hugged and supported their friend in his impending loss. I think that day, EVERYONE felt his impending loss.

Last year, our pastor lost his mother. She had been ill for a while, but we all held out hope and prayed for a miracle. She was an anchor in the church to say the least, a well loved woman with a heart to joyfully serve others in all she did. When we lost her it was one of the largest funeral processions the community had ever seen. The family has peace about losing her because they know how strong she was in her faith, but the physical pain is still raw. Days before she died I was in church with friends praying for a miracle when I suddenly felt impressed to grab a pen and paper and start writing.

What came next was a miriad of comparisons between snowflakes and diamonds..... Both are beautiful and both sparkle in the light...but that is where the similarities end. Snowflakes are fragile and have no substance...they are just beautiful frozen water and when heat is applied, they melt and are gone. Diamonds however....they are created when heat and pressure are applied and when thy are cut, they reflect light even more.

I think death is the final defining moment to show who is a diamond and who is a snowflake. Some melt and simply fade away...others grow stronger and reflect the light. We don't know how, when, or where our time will come but I pray we are all diamonds and reflect the light until our last breath is taken.

Riding Off Into the Sunset

So the time has come......my tenure at the deathstar has finally ended. After 9 years here, as of November 11th, I will finally be free. Hard to believe......but it's definitely long overdue. I still refuse to go into a long rant about how they've wronged me or whine about things that are just "so unfair"....it just doesn't serve any purpose...and for that matter I really don't want to look back on my blog and have to read about it.
The fact of the matter is, 9 years ago I loved it here....I planned to retire here....and the fact that my sweet hubby and I have been able to enjoy working together(only about 20 feet away from each other) for so long has been AWESOME! I will truly miss the commute in with him, the last minute kiss and I love yous before getting out of the car in the mornings and being able to go to lunch together everyday. Not to mention the occasional love notes tossed onto each other's desk as you quickly walk past them.
Over time though, things within the company changed, some good.....some not so good...and I have truly learned the intrinsic value in having supervisors who are not afraid to discipline employees when needed, because when unacceptable behaviour is left unchecked.....it makes life difficult for all.
So I have been looking for a long time for something better. I've gotten lots of offers and some were very good...but they just weren't where I wanted to be, or doing what I wanted to do. So I held out. Then finally last year something opened on the horizon that i just KNEW I wanted to be a part of. So I tossed my hat into the ring and due to circumstances...it just wasn't time yet. so I waited.....and every time that door popped up again I tested the water to see if it would work. Always the answer was a resounding, "not yet" .....**sigh**.....that was not easy, but I'm a big believer in the fact that "The right thing at the wrong time, equals the wrong thing" so I refused to try and MAKE it fit....it just wouldn't have been good at all......for anyone involved.
So I waited more.....then it happened....I checked in again, got a no and patiently set it down prepared to wait more....when out of the blue, a week or so later, "BAM".
My gosh......to say I was in tears of joy is a major understatement! Euphoric shock is more like it.

So, it will be a complete career change (THANK YOU LORD)....and I'll miss seeing my sweet Benny during the day....but I am soooo looking forward to the change and the new adventure this will bring. ***sigh***.....life is good.

Fur Buddies

Oy-vey………so I have soooooo much to share, but I think instead of posting one novel length entry I’ll break it up and post two, or three entries. Make things a bit more interesting…and a bit more organized.

Hmmmm…..so I think I’ll start with the boy. Now, for those of you that don’t know yet….our little Sargie is an abuse rescue puppy. Without going into a long tirade about his original owners, even though I would like to, let’s keep it simple by saying they had NO BUSINESS owning a dog! Overall, though I would say he has recovered SPECTACULARLY and has very little carry over from those first few months with them. However, one issue that we are still working on is socializing him with other dogs. Some dogs, he gets along with GREAT almost right off the bat….others however, well….not so much. People he has no issues with….he will run to you, hug you, lick you, and cry incessantly about where you have been all his life because you should have been patting him instead of being wherever you were. LOL.

When the family that rescued him for us took him, in they introduced him to their dogs and he LOVED them. Played all day and had a blast….and since then he has done the same with a couple of other dogs that he has deemed “buddy worthy”, HOWEVER…..the majority of other dogs he has NOT been so friendly with. So it has been very frustrating for us because we are doing our best to socialize him as much as possible by taking him wherever we go. In fact, eventually we would like to get him to such a point that he could be a service dog and go into convalescent homes and visit the residents. So conquering his social issues is imperative for us.

So anyway, two of our close friends, Al and Rae, just got their very own rescue dog. An ADORABLE giant gallut of a dog with one of the most docile and affectionate personalities I have seen in a dog in years. Ranger was quite literally rescued from the streets of Hartford after his original owners decided they couldn’t keep him, so they turned him loose in the city to survive on his own.

**sigh** ….oooooooohhhhhhhhhhh NOOOOOOOOOO comment……….

Anyway, Ranger is about the same age as Sargie and about two and a half times his size. Ranger however, THANKFULLY, doesn’t have the same issues with dogs that Sargie does. Instead all he knows is, “PLAY!!!! WILL YOU BE MY PLAY BUDDY?!?!?!? LET’S PLAY!!!!” He’s half Golden Retriever and half Chow-Chow, and he looks like a giant cream colored Sargie…..but a bit more lion like. Just a beautiful dog.

So the four of us decided it would be a good idea to introduce the boys, especially since we have wanted to get together for a while anyway and schedules just hadn’t allowed it. So they brought Ranger out to Isaiah on Saturday to let them meet and let’s just say Sargie’s reaction was far less than enthusiastic and I had to put the muzzle on him (poor thing looks like a K-9 Hannibal Lector when he has it on). In fact, he was downright obnoxious, and I now have a little mouth shaped bruise on my arm to prove it.

Thankfully, Rae is wonderful when it comes to this stuff. Her parents own a kennel and so she was raised around dogs and knows how to train them and how to work with them to get them through this….so her patience with Sargie was not just encouraging, but soooooooo productive. Once we got back home and Sargie realized he was going to have a furry guest at the house for dinner he was NOT happy. For the first hour and a half to two hours, we had to keep the muzzle on him. All the while though, Ranger persistently goaded him to play and refused to give up or even return Sargie’s nastiness (which would have been completely justified). Ranger would bark incessantly in Sarge’s face and ear, poke him with his nose, pull on his ears, pull his tail, chew on his legs, etc….it was hilarious. All the while Sarge would just sit and endure it with a very obvious scowl and occasionally try to nip back. FINALLY, though we had breakthrough. Rae told us to go ahead and take the muzzle off Sarge, so we did, and while she petted and occupied Ranger, we let Sarge sniff him out without fear of threat. Once Sarge decided he was ok, it was HIS turn to do the goading. So Sarge began to bark at Ranger and punch him with his nose. Now one thing you must know is that even though Sarge is a boy, he has the voice of a yippy girl. Horrifically shrill. Thankfully he really doesn’t bark very much (carry over from his abuse….they made him AFRAID to bark), but when he does….get the earplugs! So for about ten or fifteen minutes we all endured his incessant yipping back at Ranger and then it was time for the true test. Rae let Ranger go, and then LOOK OUT!

Now Ben and I don’t have a large house, it’s very small, in fact, it’s TINY. So having two dogs race through the kitchen and living room at full turbo speed was pretty funny. Of course, one of Sargie’s quirks is that he LOVES to play tag, and Ranger was only too happy to oblige. So for the next few hours they ran, chased, wrestled, flipped, jumped, skidded and chewed on each other. The amount of fur lost from them sent little doggy tumbleweeds everywhere. It was great. By the end of the night, after catching their second, third, fourth and fifth wind the two of them finally collapsed onto the floor, covered in slobber and panting like they had just climbed Mt McKinley.

It was sooooo nice to see the two of them playing and having fun. We decided to do it again as soon as possible, but for now, here’s a couple of pics from that night.