July 2nd---Eleven Months

I love this picture of Lynda.  It was made at special olympics at the activity

center in Oxford.  Not the same year that I told her to "take off" and she took her pants off at the start signal for the 50 yard dash but probably a year or two later.  She was just playing with some of the equipment and someone (or two or twenty) people were assigned to keep up with her for the day.  I never had any doubt that the people who worked and volunteered with OCDC and Lynda were tired at the end of the day.  She covered a lot of territory and so did those working to keep up with Lynda.

One of the things that I love about this picture is how it truly captured Lynda's personality.  If you knew her as a little girl you can practically expect her to walk off the page.  This picture captures her true essence at this age.  She was perceptual motion, laughter and total abandonment all rolled up into one cute little blond bombshell.  Every day was an adventure for Lynda and for those of us who were lucky enough to know her and be a part of her world.  

She had long, slender fingers and hands that her grandmother Anderson always said were meant to play the piano.  Lynda used them to her advantage to be able to reach objects that we all assumed were far out of her reach.  It was about this age that we coined the term "stretch armstrong" for her because of those beautifully skilled hands and arms at reaching the unreachable.  

Lynda has reached the unreachable for sure now.  She spent almost 43 years on earth and now walks with Jesus in heaven.  During the past 11 months since Lynda died time has seem to morph into a different system of keeping pace.  It just seems like every day without her is longer than 24 hours and the years before the stroke seem to be a million years ago.

I have prepared myself for this month of July a year after Lynda became ill enough to enter intensive care.  I have cautioned my heart that it will have to hold even more love and that it cannot break anymore.  I've reminded my brain that Lynda is with the One who created her and that she wants for nothing so that I can walk through the first year anniversary of the things that are not celebrations but remembrances of things I would just as soon forget.  I have done all of these things because I want to look toward heaven and smile at the victory Jesus has provided for Lynda...even on the one year anniversary of the day she crossed over from this world to that of eternal sunshine.  

God has been good to me and has held my heart in his arms as only He can do.  I trust Him to carry me through the coming month and August 2nd when we will celebrate Lynda's victory over death.  I love looking at this picture of total happiness and imagining what she must be experiencing now.  How my mother's heart bursts with joy as I rest in the knowledge that she has overcome the world and walks among the angels.