"Death is nothing else but going home to God,
the bond of love will be unbroken for all eternity." Mother Teresa
It has been 2 ½ months since I left John and I’s home in Southern Oregon.
I started my new job on July 14th
and have been pretty busy ever since. I
am really grateful for the new job and to the leaders that hired me. It has been challenging and keeps me really
busy. I work in Human Resources so a lot
of time is spent helping and developing others.
I am finding that when I have to help others, it allows me to take the
focus away from my new world, and for that, I am grateful.
Fayetteville, WV has been a blessing as well. Fayetteville is a friendly small town, with a
population of around 3000 people, nestled in the heart of the New River Gorge
and the Gauley River. I’ve never made
friends anywhere as quickly as I have in Fayetteville. When I am not at work, I spend a lot of time hiking
or riding the trails with Jake. When I
want to talk to John, I go to the woods.
John and I spent a lot of time in West Virginia kayaking the New and
Gauley rivers. We loved this part of the
country and always felt happy to spend a weekend here. Now it is my new home. This past weekend was the first Gauley weekend
release. Some of John and I’s closest
friends came up for the weekend to kayak and support me through that mile
stone. I felt the tears well as I pushed
off the river bank into the foggy river and hit the first wave train. Once I made it down to a unique rapid called “Koontz
Flume,” I decided to start singing through each wave hit the way John did when
he spent time on the river. It was
amazing how much my surroundings seemed to change when this happened. It was as if John was right beside me,
guiding me through each rapid. I started
to smile by the time I got to “Canyon Doors,” looked up at the sky and blew my
love a kiss, thanking him for reminding me that yes, kayaking is fun, and he is
here through each line. It was a good day on the river.
I often look up during the busyness of the day and wonder, how did I get
here? What happened to my beautiful
life? The homesickness I feel for my
husband is beyond anything I could have imagined. I can remember when John was in graduate
school and I was working in Richmond. We
did that for two years. I remember the
way it felt when I wouldn’t see him for a couple weeks. When we moved to Oregon, John and I spent a
month apart so I could wrap up my current job and finalize our house selling plans. That was excruciating. We spent time on
google chat every night just so we could see each other’s faces, and Jakes of
course. I remember aching for him then
while knowing I would see him soon.
There are no words to describe how this feels now. I don’t know if there is a word worthy of
describing it. I was folding laundry in
my basement on Monday before driving to Charlotte and looked up at a jacket of
John’s that I hung up on the clothes line when I moved in so it would not get
wrinkled. I thought about how he wore
that very jacket only 6 months ago and how handsome he looked in it. I dropped to my knees in that moment of realization and felt my chest
getting tighter, my vision get blurry, and my breathing increase. He’ll never wear that jacket again, because
he is no longer physically here and there is NOTHING I can do about it. This reality makes me panic at times. It is a hopeless feeling, and when I really
allow myself to think about the reality of that situation, I can’t
breathe. This is a reality that I’ve
realized is not going away. While it
does not define me, it truly is a part of me, and I have to figure out who I am
supposed to be now with this loss. The old
me is gone, I said goodbye to her when I said goodbye to John. So who am I?
These are questions that have come to light since moving back east,
questions that may take a while to figure out, yet they must be answered.
There has been a lot of change in my life this year. My parents recently divorced, my sister and
brother in-law followed their dreams and opened up an art studio, I moved to
the West Coast, I moved to the East Coast, my brother wrote his first book, I
met Melissa Joyce (she saves me daily), I switched jobs twice, I started playing music
again, my family has come together, my family has fallen apart, my husband died, my husband died, my husband died, my husband died. Yet, people continue to live their lives,
experience happiness, accomplish goals, they live. I have to admit, I found this offensive at
first. Why is anyone going on? John is gone, therefore my world has stopped. Why has the entire world not stopped? Home is where John is, so where is my home? Happiness, love, laughter, personal goals,
life. All of these things for me lead to
John, yet I have no way of getting to him while I’m here. I can’t call him, see him, touch him, hear
him. I never will while I am here, and
the feeling this brings to my heart, I have no words for. Yet life continues, some days in zombie mode,
but it continues, and what choice do we have?
What choice does anyone have? Of
course, the world continues onward and people left behind must keep
moving.
I have been thinking a lot about death lately. From the moment I was told John was dead, I
began to think about his new life and what this must be like for him. I picture him the moment I wake up and I pray
for dreams of him to come when I sleep. I
found and gave my life over to God when I was a senior in college and have felt
his love ever sense. I admit, my faith
was questioned at the moment of John’s death and at the pain this caused not just me but his family and friends. Watching what John's death has done to those that love him brings me to my knees at times. But, through this incredible pain,
I know God is present and I believe John is present.
I
read a lot about those that have had near death experiences and I find their
testimonies to be incredible. There are
hundreds of individuals throughout this world that have experienced what I
think is a glimpse at the afterlife, and it blows my mind how similar these
experiences are. The most incredible
similarity I have found in these readings, is that not one individual that went
through this wanted to come back. Some
are actually upset when they realize they are back. Many say that during this experience, the
love they felt and the beauty they saw is beyond words. There is nothing on earth that can come close
to even comparing to it. They didn’t
want to come back. I picture this perfection for
John every day. John’s grandmother
called me the other day and told me that when she sees a beautiful mountain or
river, it makes her sad to know that John isn’t here to see it. I told her that what John see’s now I believe
is magnificent and I know he can’t wait to show her. It's more beautiful than any river or mountain we have ever seen.
What John’s grandmother and I feel sad for is the fact that we can’t have
John physically here with us, standing beside us in those moments of complete
beauty. I am not sad for where he is and
what I believe he is experiencing, I have a feeling he can’t wait to show me. I don’t think any of us fully understand what
comes next until our time comes.
“Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen.” Hebrews 11:1
No matter how unbearable this pain feels at times, and no matter how
desperately I want to see John right now, I really do believe in the evidence
of things not seen. There have been too
many moments where I felt him, and continue to feel the love of God. I think of our reunion everyday, the substance of things hoped for.
So through the winds of change, we must continue to breathe, move and
live. For what choice do we have while
we are here? To me, making that choice
every morning puts my faith into action, and it honors my husband
John. What we do here matters.
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