Tucked Inside a Place Called Nostalgia...

Every day that goes by I pray that my heart will be strong enough to keep beating when the first anniversary of your earthly death arrives.  I am blessed to be able to look beyond the grave through Christ's sacrifice to see you eternally alive but I am still left with this mother's heart that is breaking all over again.

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.

What A Difference A Year Can Make...

In the stack of mail yesterday was a letter from social services at NMRC. It's now been a year since Lynda became ill and ultimately passed away on August 2nd. there were a few pieces of information that continued to come after her death but I haven't gotten anything from NMRC in several months. When I saw the envelope, I of course wondered what it could be but I just thought it might be something related to the picture they had hung of Lynda or maybe some event they thought we might be interested in attending. I opened it and it was the recreation therapy schedule for the month of July. Every month, parents and guardians received a schedule of the activities that rec therapy (which was Kevin's department at NMRC) would be providing for the clients each day and at night. They might go bowling, have a dance or Lynda's favorite---go for rides in the van. How we got "back" on the mailing list after Lynda's death is one of those computer glitches. I know they have deleted our name from the list because for almost a year, we haven't received anything. Yet, somehow here it was in the mail and in my trembling hands.

I quickly told my brain (and my heart) this was okay. I didn't read anything on the page. I just folded it back up and put it back into the envelope. As Russ walked in from outside, he could tell I was visibly shaken so I just held up the envelope and handed it to him and kept walking to the back of the house. All the way down the hall I kept telling myself to think of something else. Think of something else but the great big letters J U L Y kept flashing in my mind and by the time Russ made it back to the bedroom I was sobbing. The things we have taken for granted for so many years suddenly become painful reminders of how life can change in a flash and in a flash...a whole year can be rolled back to when the grief is so fresh and raw. It was a strange mixture of bittersweet feelings. So thankful that she had been at NMRC where there was a whole page devoted each month to activities planned for the clients based on their needs AND the realization yet again that Lynda was no longer at NMRC and just a few miles away in Oxford.

It's not hard to redirect my heart to heaven where I know God has the most fabulous activities planned daily for Lynda and her friends. I smile thinking of how much fun she must be having. It just never ceases to amaze me at how the heart has a mind all its own. You can't reason with your heart any more than you can try to hold the wind in your hand. So...might as well just go with the ebb and flow of these emotions God has given me all wrapped up in the title of being a mother. And for that I am blessed and wouldn't change a thing. God is good all the time!

Inspiration....

I wish I had a nickel for every time I've heard the phrase "it takes a special kind of person to care for a child with special needs"...When I taught a class at Scott Center for children with multiple exceptionalities, the staff used to joke about the "stars in our crowns" because we had been told so many times that we would have them...stars in our crowns, that is.

I think all of the other teachers felt the same as I did (and do)...it would be the kids who had the crowns and the stars.   None of us felt that we were doing anything that was deserving of crowns or stars for them.  We were doing what we loved and we felt we had the best kept secret in the world.  We were the ones who had the best jobs in the world working with the coolest kids ever and we could never understand all of the fuss.

A child certainly inspired me to be a special kind of person...one who teaches children with special needs.  I suppose it does take a special kind of person to care for a child with special needs...  It takes someone who is willing to be inspired by the child whom we are privileged to care for.  Lynda continues to inspire me even after she is no longer with me on this earth.  She is the reason I aspire to be the best special education teacher that I can be and why I so willingly continue to advocate for those who cannot speak for themselves.  Lynda will forever be my inspiration.  She will forever be the reason that I do what I do.

Smile Because It Happened....

Today I was thinking about the summer.  We've already been to the beach and the summer has just begun and I want to go back.  I want to go back to the beach and the way we feel when we're "at the beach".  I want to go back to the time that Lynda was little and her presence was more than a memory. I want to go back but I can't.  None of us can really.

So it got me to thinking about how quickly life can change in a moment.  Sixty seconds can change a life and nothing will ever be just the same.  However, it works both ways;  good and bad.  Wonder why we only dwell on the ways that life changes in ways we don't prefer?  Every minute of every day God is making changes in our lives that we all too often just take for granted.  So it got me to thinking today---why can't we live every day like we're at the beach.  We still have the wonderful memories of the gentle waves coming in to the shore until the waves seem to be too full to move another inch and they explode and ricochet from one side to the other.  I love to watch the white froth spill over and the water rush to the shore.  Then as if by magic, the water is sucked back into the ocean and the white sand seems to dry as the wave returns to get ready for its next arrival.  I can hear it in my ears and I can feel the rumbles.  If I close my eyes, I'm there again.  The sounds of the birds and the squeals of the kids playing.  I can feel the warmth of the sun on my skin and in my mind, I'm there again.

I would love to live there every day and for five glorious years, we did live at the beach.  Earlier years with Lynda in Alabama we were just an hour and a half away from paradise.  Her hair was the color of the white sands of the emerald coast and the vastness of the ocean only intensified how small she was in comparison.  I think of her now and I try in my human mind to comprehend how much more wonderful heaven is than the most beautiful place I've seen on earth.

As the summer begins, I can't help but be reminded that it was this time last year that Lynda's health issues began with a blood clot in her leg and culminated with her death at the beginning of August.  However, Lynda's life was so much more than June to August of last year.  For all of the days and months and years that God shared Lynda with me, I am so thankful.  I can close my eyes and still hear her sweet voice.  I can feel her hand on my shoulder. 

When I think of Lynda, I have to smile.  When I think of heaven, I know it's not really over.  

Nine Thousand Views Humbles Us....

We are humbled by your support by viewing and reading Lynda's blog.  As summer has arrived, the loss seems to be magnified as we approach the one year anniversary of her death.  How I wish I could spend time with her today and feel her sweet pats on my back as we walked together.  Thank you for continuing to pray for our family.  God is so good all of the time!

Ten Months Ago Today....

Ten months today, Lynda went to be with the Lord in paradise.  This past week-end, Russ and I went to Destin for a few days and I planned to come back through Brewton, Alabama where Lynda was born and became my daughter.  The closer the time came to heading home, the more convinced I became that I could not go back to the house we lived in or walk the sidewalks she and I walked so many times.  No matter how much I'd like to go...I couldn't.  Not yet.

The beach reminded me of Lynda.  Actually, everything about everything reminds me of Lynda now that I'm out of school and my mind is quiet.  She loved the outdoors.  She loved the beach.  She LOVED water and she was fearless.  The little water wings she's wearing in the pictures is strictly for those of us with her.  SHE did not need them to dog paddle around the pool and she certainly didn't need them to put her head under the water and  hold her breath for far longer than I could hold mine waiting for her to surface.

Lynda LOVED water.  In the bathtub.  In the fountain in the Pensacola mall.  In the pool.  She just loved everything about it.  When she was in water she was free and she was the happiest of happy. Just look at the expression on this sweet face.  You don't need to even see her mouth to know that she was grinning from ear to ear and splashing and kicking and having a blast.

I walked through Cracker Barrel this morning and everything I looked at reminded me of something I would have bought for her.  Lynda was summertime.  She was sunshine and pools and beaches.  I dressed her in aquas and pinks....all of the colors that are everywhere at this time of the year.  I don't guess I will ever get out of the habit of seeing clothes and for a split second find myself looking for her size.  Today grief rolled over me like the huge waves in the gulf.  I was surprised at the intensity.  I was surprised it could slip up on me so unexpectedly and knock the wind out of my gut as if I was hit square in the heart.  It was raw and it amazed me when my heart broke again as I approached summer but this time without her.  I couldn't run over to Oxford to see her.  No new revelation since I had just visited her grave before we left for Florida yet it was as if I had heard for the first time of her death. I stood in the middle of Cracker Barrel in Tupelo, Mississippi and heard my heart tell my brain as if for the first time...she's gone.  She's really gone.  Not forever because I know I'll see her again one day but today I wasn't thinking about the "by and by in heaven".  I was thinking of the "here and now of earth" and I was NOT expecting it to hurt so much again.

Yes, I have been dreading June turning into July and the one year anniversary of "the day she went to the emergency room", "the day she went on the respirator", "the day we removed her from the respirator"... Why can't my mind skip over these months.  I do know how the story ended after all and I'm not eager to relive each detail again.  So I try and steel my emotions and keep very busy.  My logical mind tries to reason with my mother's heart that we would be better off to try not to dwell on those things but instead think of the good times.  And so I do but I haven't mastered this grieving thing yet and some days it slips up on me and threatens to pull me down like the riptide.  I can waste all of my energy trying to swim against the flow or just finally save my energy and swim parallel with the shore till I'm out of the tug of the riptide's force.  I can survive that way.  To continue to fight the riptide is not beneficial of safe.  Many don't survive.  I am a survivor.  Lynda has taught me that through her example.  Because of being Lynda's Nana I can take the words of Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You'll Dance" song to heart.

                                                            Because I Am Lynda's Nana      

I will never lose my sense of wonder,
I may get my fill to eat but will always keep that hunger,
I will NEVER take one single breath for granted,
and because of you love will never leave me empty handed,
I still feel small when I stand beside the ocean,
Whenever one door closes I know one more opens,
I promise that because of you I will always give faith a fighting chance,
And when I get the choice to sit it out or dance.

I'll always dance....I'll ALWAYS dance!

Lynda I know you're dancing in heaven and because I know this to be true...when I have the change to sit it out or dance...I'LL ALWAYS DANCE!  I may sit it out for a day or so like today but I'll be back up dancing because I know I'm going to see you again.  Hope you're swimming in heaven and dancing on the stars.