Love and Life

Discernment

Posted by

0

Dear Cheryl,

I have not written to you for awhile. You know that I miss you on and off. I never know when that will be. Now is one of those times.

Let me explain. Yesterday Debbie and I had a July 4th grill out spontaneously on the 6th because she was off that day and we wanted to do that. She invited Nancy (You remember Nancy from church? You used to put Kleenex in her basket when you forgot the where you put the money I gave you?) and Debbie’s daughter Sarah was there as well as Adam. Sarah’s new gentleman friend, Gavin and his son Conner came too. It was fun and we had hamburgers and corn and Tommy’s potatoes. (I wish you were here. You would have loved it.)

When Nancy left in the early evening, she asked me if I was ever coming back to church. My answer was and is, I don’t know.

When you were alive I knew it was important to you. I think for me it has never been as important to me as it was to you. Now that you are gone it has little importance for me. I realize now that the attraction to mass and church and being involved was driven by you and the kids and their early involvement. I am not sure that I have that same drive that you did. You were better at church than I am.

And now, church is changing again. As I write this I realize that the whole church thing was a stability in our life. It was an anchor. We both went. When you became sicker it was a need for me. I needed to take you there so that the constant of church was still there in your life and ours. All of the rest of our existence was shattering as we came to our end.

Nancy mentioned to Debbie as she left that she hoped she had not upset me by asking about church. She did not. But she did make me think about it. Today I am thinking about attending daily mass. That would put church back into my life on my own basis.

After searching another Nativity’s webpage, I found the information pictured here. My first impression is that Church of the Nativity is being slowly disassembled. And eventually this year, I guess, the five parishes will be something else – Transfiguration?

Another piece of our life will be gone.

I am still processing the fact that you are gone. It will be that way for the rest of my time here without you.

Debbie is great and I love her and I love being around her.

Today I am thinking about you and church and stability. It appears that Nativity has a daily mass on Tuesday and Friday at 8:15am. Daily is two days a week.

The universe is distracting today. I will review how many days make a weeks worth of days.

Thanks for listening to me today. I can hear you encouraging me to return to church without you. I will consider it. (I am in discernment.)

I will love you always,

Paul

Let your mind wander

Posted by

0

One of Debbie’s favorite activities is to look at houses for sale. She sends me a link from the real estate broker site and refers to it as the house of the day. I tend to find it on Google maps and sometimes look on the county auditor’s site to examine its history both pricewise and ownership.

One little house we examined became a writing prompt and the following story came out.

Porter and Fannie

Porter and Fannie met in the summer of 1980. There was a neighborhood party that welcomed Porter to the neighborhood and celebrated July 4th.

Porter was a common sight shortly after he moved in to the apartment building down the block from Fannie. He had a well mannered corgi that he walked twice a day once in the early morning before going to work and once, sometimes twice, after dinner, both his own and Marshall’s. Marshall was the name of the corgi. Its full name was Howdy Marshall which was what Porter said when he found him wandering in his old neighborhood.

Marshall was so well mannered and friendly Porter was certain that his owner was nearby. That started a thorough but unfruitful search for its owner. No one near where Porter lived at the time recognized Marshall.

Porter was a walker and a sometimes jogger. That day he was walking and enjoying the January sun. Marshall appeared from behind some bushes in a nearby front yard wearing a collar with a star shaped badge that had no identifying information so Porter assumed the dog belonged to the house. Marshall reinforced that by following him up the steps and sitting beside him as he pressed the doorbell.

“Good morning! Just walking by and I think your corgi has gotten out.”, he said to the young woman who answered the door. Marshall sat happily nearby with a big dog smile and his tongue hanging sideways.

“Nope. Not mine. He’s cute though. I don’t think he belongs to anyone around here. I’ve never seen him before.”, she replied. “I’m Tammy, by the way.”

“Porter”, he replied. “No one that you know of has a corgi?”

“No. Sorry.”

“Well, I guess I’ll keep looking. Thanks for your help.” Porter turned to go and Marshall followed him.

“I know you want to be here but I can’t keep you. No dogs where I live. I’m not sure I can have a pet. And why aren’t you wearing any ID?”, he said to the dog. Some of this was vocally and some of this conversation was mental but as he knelt down to examine the corgi more closely he realized that Marshall was injured on his hind quarters. “Did some one snatch you and you got away? Does that hurt?” He reached out to pet the dog and examine his injury. The little animal stood patiently while Porter did his examination. Porter picked the dog up and crossed the street towards the block that his building was on.

When he got home he tracked down a nearby vet and found that he could take Marshall there that afternoon.

Marshall’s injuries where minor. The vet remarked that the injury to it rear leg could have easily happened when the dog was shoved out of a car door. And after listening to Porter’s story about how he came to be in possession of the dog he remarked, “No charge.” Porter left with Marshall happily wagging his tail. The vet had given him no shots.

Porter spent the next few weeks posting printed notices and placing the same information on Facebook and other social media platforms to no avail. Perhaps the vet was right. Some one had tossed Marshall from a car when they were done taking care of him. Who could have done such a thing? Marshall, Porter was by this time calling the dog Marshall and the dog would alert to that name when Porter said it out loud, for his part acted as though he had found his master back. Lots of tail wagging and excited play demonstrated this behavior daily to Porter.

Porter had not owned a dog before and had not even considered it but something in him now extended an attachment and connection to this creature smaller than him. His landlord, when Porter inquired, told him that dogs where not allowed but that he could temporarily house the dog while he sought out the true owner. As it became more and more apparent that Marshall was a castaway, Porter started looking for a new place to be with the corgi.

He found an apartment in a building in a neighborhood with which he was unfamiliar. This area was closer to his office and fortuitously he could, if he chose, ride his bike to work. As he settled into his new situation he walked Marshall everywhere he could nearby. This neighborhood he usually drove his SUV through on the way to and from work. As he roamed with Marshall, he looked at the buildings and houses. He said hello and talked to the people.

There were several other neighbors with dogs. Marshall also made contact with much butt sniffing and sometimes friendly, sometimes unfriendly noises. These encounters consumed enough time that eventually Porter became known to the neighborhood and conversations beyond a hand wave were commonplace. Dog owners have a special bond and that camaraderie extends to other owners.

A few months after Porter had moved in, he passed by Fannie’s house. She was weeding her garden and Marshall gently crept up next to her to examine her activity. Porter was distracted by a phone call as he was walking the dog after work. Marshal had taken his extendable leash all the way to the end before Porter noticed. Porter almost tripped over it. Fannie petted Marshall.

“Aren’t you cute!” she said to Marshall. Marshall wagged his tail in response.

“His name is Marshall”, said Porter. “I am Porter. I hope he didn’t surprise you.”

“Howdy, Marshall!” said Fannie to the corgi. “I’m Fannie. It’s a great evening for a walk.” she said to Porter taking off her glove to shake hands.

“Howdy Marshall is his full name. It’s what I said to him when I found him walking in my old neighborhood.”

They chatted for awhile about dogs and flowers. Marshall politely stretched out the leash to get mostly out of site near a tree to defecate.

“I’m sorry about that.” Porter told Fannie as he stooped to recover Marshall’s business into a plastic bag he brought with him specifically for the purpose.

“It’s okay. The neighborhood dogs like that spot. Not everyone cleans up after their dog. Thank you for doing that.”

It was an early summer evening in late June. Fannie and Porter talked for almost an hour during that first encounter. When the neighborhood 4th of July celebration was announced by her neighbors she volunteered her backyard which was on the corner and the next time she saw Porter and Marshall, she invited him and Marshall to the party.

In the evening dusk of the 4th when the neighborhood children were agitating and nagging their Dads to start the fireworks show. Porter and Fannie drifted off the corner porch to watch the show. Marshall sat for a minute and looked at Porter. Eventually the corgi positioned himself under their side-by-side chairs and waited anxiously while watching several kids with sparklers. If corgis could speak he might say, “Keep those sparklers in the street!”

The universe put them together at just the right time.

Love bloomed at that party. Marshall had a home with humans. He was unafraid of the fireworks show. He felt safe and fell asleep.

Where does fiction come from? This little story just came out of my fingers thinking about Porter and Fannie. Their names are on the county auditor’s site as previous owners of the house that Debbie sent one morning.

Carpe Diem.

3 AM Sometimes

Posted by

0

Day Six and Beyond

A major surgery makes one think about things one might not think about.

I awoke from a nap this afternoon wondering what God had in mind. I imagine that we all have these thoughts occasionally. What is the big picture? Or is there a picture? I could feel the love from people near me in my life.

Love is a powerful emotion. It is freely given.

The person that I am with, Debbie, is staying with me to help me through this piece of the recovery journey. After Cheryl’s death I did not think that I would feel the same way for anyone again. Debbie makes me happy. It is that simple. Loving someone is a connection between souls. It is deeper. She is here with me through this recovery and I am more concerned for her health and well being than my own. Love is a two-way street.

Last night a spontaneous gathering arose as David, doing his master chef on the grill, invited his brother and family to join us. Love was in the air then too.

My sister and I talk every day. This is something we have not done since we were children. There are three time zones between us which adds certain amount of thought process on my eastern end when I want to initiate a communication. It seems to work out though. Love figures into the process.

It is as though the love that I radiated out during my previous life before my heart attack is returned as I need it. A simple beautiful concept, love the people around you and they will love you back.

These past few days as I recover post-surgery, I am overwhelmed by love.

I am grateful.

Carpe Diem.

Another Fine Mess

Posted by

3

Here is what happened…. about a week ago I road my bike about 6 miles or so on some great Monday weather in southwest Ohio. I felt an odd pain in my left breast that ran down my arm but to me at the time I thought – Oh you are straining that muscle you hurt last year. The pain went away after I stopped and rested a bit. That should have been a clue but it was not to me. On and off over the next few days it came back. I began to think that maybe I should get it checked out.

Debbie encouraged me to do just that and I made an appointment with my primary care person.

The ache in my left breast and trailer down my arm came back with a vengeance on Saturday while I was starting to put a porch glider together for Debbie. I still thought it was nothing and sat down for awhile and the pain subsided. (I just called it a pain. I did not do that then.) Debbie convinced me that it was not nothing and I should get it checked out.

We went to Jewish Hosp. and on Monday morning they did an angio-thingy to see what the problem was. I will interrupt my story a bit to mention that I was not in favor of visiting an ER on Saturday because no matter what, gray hair and chest discomfort – medical folks like that term instead of pain – will equal staying the night and the next day. I will admit that I should not be so cynical about that but it seems to be the way of our world and what the doctor found was worse that I thought.

I took up riding a bike again a few years ago. I did that a lot when I was younger.

When I retired from my engineering and service career I started walking a lot. Typically five miles or so for a typical trek around the neighborhood. We lived in a community that was perched on top of a ridge and I made a game of walking a long distance without going downhill. Over time I varied my walks to include parks and hills. When I saw my doctor for an annual checkup he said, “you’ve lost ten pounds!” instead of hello. The bike riding was a natural extension of that activity.

It got me through the first summer after Cheryl died. I was outside and in the sun.

According to the surgeon the right coronary artery to my heart is 99% blocked and there is blockage elsewhere. (It is remarkable to me that I don’t have more pain. Now, for example I have none.) The report that I have from this procedure states that the left anterior descending artery is 95% blocked with a couple of the branches 75% and 50% blocked. Doctors like to write stenosis so the verbiage is stenosed.

Yesterday there were a bunch of tests to find the extra tubing and to determine where the calcified stenosis blockages are best detoured around to fix me. Something called a cardiac arterial bypass graft (cabbage) is in my future on Friday.

Wow I thought. I just do not feel that bad.

At this point I am just beginning to understand the value of having another caring person in your life, a person that is not afraid to say to you that you are wrong about some things, that person for me is Debbie. If she had not insisted that I get checked out I might still be at home wondering what that pain was and masking it with Tylenol or ibuprofen or both.

The moral here is if you are having twinges in your chest in your left breast and your left arm is following the dance in full romance get checked out. Or you might check out.

Debbie is with me through all of this. No doubt the universe is unfurling as it should.

Carpe the damn Diem but do not ignore what your body is saying.

Dad

Posted by

0

Who was your most influential teacher? Why?

My most influential teacher is/was my father.

Oh, you say. You cannot use a parent, but I say I must. I wrote is above because he still influences my thoughts occasionally.

Our parents are in all of us. We carry their DNA. DNA is more than just heredity. It is attitude and character. It is love and dislike. It is friendship and beauty. It is many things beyond the physical.

In my dad’s case he was a technician and a technical thinker. I spent my working career as an engineer. I have always felt that I learned the practical aspects of that calling from him. Later on as I got older I went to school to pick up some of the math that I did not quite understand.

He did not push it on me. He did teach me how to analyze problems and think for myself.

Carpe Daddio.

A Summer Day in Winter and other Thoughts

Posted by

0

A Summer Day

Who made the world?

Who made the swan, and the black bear?

Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean —

the one who has flung herself out of the grass,

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down —

who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,

which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?

Tell me, what is it you plan to do

with your one wild and precious life?

These words by Mary Oliver send my thoughts in many directions. The last two lines seem to be very popular with the counted cross stitch and embroidery set. These are words of inspiration to the young.

The previous two lines “Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?” seem a lament for the old. We tell ourselves, we have lived life as best we thought at the time.

Do I have regrets? “Tell me, what else should I have done?” hides in the back of other thoughts. What could I have done different that would put me in a better place today? How would I define “better place”?

Grief, that missing another, that emptiness for love’s object, that restless lonely, that longing, is often with me at seemingly random times. It will always be there. It is smoother on some days. I noticed this past evening as I talked to my son that I could tell stories and talk about Cheryl without choking up. Cheryl and I had many great times.

In the now, my son and his wife are splitting. My girlfriend’s daughter is very ill. She is hospitalized with an undefined infection. My girlfriend’s youngest son has split with his significant other and that is a remarkable similarity to my son’s situation. He has snapped back to his savior and supporter, Mom. (She has pushed him out of the nest several times. It is hard (but time) for him to fly on his own.) I have interest and concern for all of these people in my life. They give me a place to send my love and support.

“Tell me, what else couldI do?” is a question I ask of myself but it is an unfair question. Simply being present to other’s needs and being there as they sort through their difficulties is enough. I do not volunteer a solution if I have one. It would be my solution, not their solution. The same heartfelt commitment would not be there. (My mother would say, ‘Pull up your socks!’, which was her way of saying you have to be the designer of your own way out, otherwise you are not committed to it.)

My son is staying with me in the guest bedroom while he sorts through moving vehicles, furniture and just plain stuff accumulated over time to his new rental digs.

Debbie’s daughter is in the best hospital in town. They are committed to finding out what is wrong in her anatomy and doing their best to fix it or mitigate it.

Debbie’s son has a short term solution for housing and a wonderful employer that seems committed to his success. Maybe her consultation support is of greater value to him than monetary support. Maybe he will come to understand that. Maybe he will be able to move on from this former girlfriend who suddenly turned physically violent toward him. Maybe he will realize what he feels is grief of a sort for a lost relationship.

I do know how to pay attention, and listen and offer advice when asked and pray that God will provide a stable solution to the currently evolving dilemmas.

Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? If not die, at least, stop?

Maybe not soon enough? Was that snarky?

I love them all.

Carpe Diem.

Little Women

Posted by

0

I stood on the scale and as luck would have it, no weight loss and no weight gain either.

Huh. Alas. Alack. Oh whoa is me. Or is it?

The new snow is coating the grass.

The early morning sky is azure blue as the sun blazes near the eastern horizon.

The chilly birds are dive bombing Jane’s feeder next door.

It is a new day!

These thoughts come to me in rapid fire as I awaken more fully while drinking my coffee and thinking about the previous evening. The play “Little Women” was excellent. The production itself is a co-production, a special partnership between two theaters working on a single play. The play was staged first in Portland and then here in Cincinnati. Debbie and I went to see it last night during one of our field trips. The play itself tells the stories within Little Women but focuses on Louisa May Alcott as a writer and her life.

At intermission we had a conversation with a younger man seated next to us. He asked how longer we had been together. I responded with “about a year and a half.” I did not think much of it but Debbie picked up on the fact that he thought I was joking. Debbie talked to him for a bit and found out that he was from out of town.

Later as we drove home she told me that he thought we had been together for a long time, an easy assumption to make since we are both older. When she corrected his notion he was interested in our story. Her synopsis of us meeting later in life interested him.

Yesterday was a pleasant day. The play was well done.

There have been many instances now where total strangers have commented on the love and affection vibe that they perceive between us.

I feel that way about Debbie and she feels that way about me.

It shows.

Carpe Diem.

mushrooms

Church, Mass, Catholicism

Posted by

0

A few weeks ago on Sunday before church began I wrote – What do I want to takeaway from my time in mass today? And further I wrote – What for the rest of the day?

As to the first prompt, I went to Sunday mass (11AM service) which Cheryl and I did not do for some time. Early on in our marriage we went to the 9AM service. There were 5 masses at our parish in those days. Later as the church changed and even later as Cheryl’s disease progressed we attended 4:30 mass which became 5:15 mass which eventually died a slow death with little participation. After her death I returned to 5:15 mass and over time I was comforted by friends. Now this mass is gone from the schedule too. I think my takeaway is that the Roman Catholic church has lost touch with the congregation.

There is only one mass time at my parish now. It was not crowded. It should have been crowded but it was okay that it was not crowded. The holiday is over and much is back to normal. Small attendance masses are peaceful.

Thinking this way is the way I think about busses. They run all the time on specific routes. If I find one convenient I get on and ride. But only certain routes and certain times are crowded. Riding an empty-ish bus in the mid-morning can be peaceful much like a city tour bus without the scratchy public address system.

Limited access highways are like this in the morning and late afternoon. Expressways, however, are never peaceful.

Masses ought to happen on a fixed schedule, so I can get in and get some holy, is probably a selfish attitude. I will think about that for some time. I may never find a conclusion. It is that sort of a question, one with no answer, for me to ponder as I get older and put more of life in the past.

I think many dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church have lost touch with their congregations but that thought is not my only takeaway. I went back to church after Cheryl died to look for the peacefulness missing in my life. For a while I found it there. I moved from where we often sat so that I could see Cheryl in the pew from a different position. It was peaceful and I was surrounded by friends. The Church is the congregation.

In the time that has passed since I started this essay, I have visited and thought and revisited it several times. What is it that I want from church? It is community. It is belonging. It is love. It is morality. It is sharing the journey. It is belief in a universal consciousness we call God and sharing that belief with others.

How does one become spiritual? And why do I (me, myself) attend this specific service. The first and most glaring reason is that it is the spiritual system with which I am most familiar. I was brought up Catholic so at this point in my life it may be nothing stronger than indoctrination. There must be something more than that idea in me.

In a similar vein, what is the meaning of life? What is my purpose in it? Am I achieving my purpose? If I cannot figure out my purpose, how will I know if I achieve it? Is it important to achieve it? As I get older I find myself searching for this, an unknown, a “may never be known”, the church might say, “a cannot be known.” I search for peace in my heart with not knowing my purpose.

To just be is enough for now.

Carpe Diem

A 2026 Calendar

Posted by

0

Time and Dates and Events

The activity of marking and acknowledging life events was Cheryl’s job. All through 2025 I realized how much I missed her and her organizational ability when my date dyslexia would dissipate for a moment and would remember that I forgot some important event like a birthday or anniversary. These, of course, were an important acknowledgment of some life altering event. Something to be commemorated. Something to be celebrated. Or something to be commiserated.

To her life was a continuum but it was marked by various events both good and bad.

When she moved to a memory care facility and I disassembled her office back into a guest bedroom, I developed a simple sorting method for her clutter. Clutter is an unkind word because in her own mind as it disintegrated she was doing real work and “getting things done.” It breaks my heart when I think about it. Scattered in various storage spaces in my condominium now I have collected the clutter into three general categories: pictures, letters, notes.

The pictures are easy. They are of our family and friends and sometimes Christmas postcards that show the growth of often far flung friends and family. In earlier times she sorted and organized these. During the last few years of her life she sorted and organized but the associations were meaningless to others, as well as, her after she had done so.

The letters did not need separation or organization. These were separated into their own file folder. Cheryl and I wrote many many letters back and forth while in high school. I have these collected with my own response in my office.

Her notes I sorted into their own tubs and a couple boxes. I hope to write a memoir as I review her notes to herself.

Today I went through the big black book that we (I) purchased for her to help her remember birthdays and anniversaries when her cognitive function was fading. The BBB is its own category. It has all the dates of family and friends births and anniversaries and in some cases, their deaths. It has also collected many other notes and pictures paper-clipped and stapled here and there at random. This coming year I hope to remember my family’s birthdays and although I am not a card sender, I can acknowledge the date.

It is hard for me to go through this book to recover birth data because it contains cognitive data and the lack there of as well. This note, stuck in the book on April 15th, reminds me how upon occasion her cognitive ability returned for short periods

– DO NOT worry about greeting cards for the W/girls for now) (too much stress –

I do not know which W/girls she referred to but her mind was telling her to relax a bit. The note is printed in all caps. Mileena’s birthday is noted on the page above this note and the parenthesis are askew, nevertheless, she recognized her internal stress about getting it right and wrote herself a note to let it go. She consistently wrote notes to herself about this or that and attached the notes to that or this. The attachment did not always go with the note.

I did achieve my goal. I constructed a calendar of my own and slid it into a plastic sheet protector. I laid it on the kitchen table so that I can ignore it in a brighter light filled room. (When she was alive it resided in the hallway to our bedroom.)

Better in Retirement

I am ready for 2026.

Carpe Diem.

Funerals

Posted by

0

These events are for the living. The usefulness to the living is a final farewell. The tradition helps the living cope with the fact that they too will eventually succumb. (Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, we are here and then we are not.) Nice music and often monotonic recitation of traditional prayer provides solace.

This particular funeral service was held for my sister-in-law. Three of us brothers-in-law are widowers now. Is this a trend? I hope not. I chose to sit near the back of the church to avoid sitting with the grieving immediate family and to be alone with my own thoughts. Cheryl is still fresh in my mind.

As the homilist was speaking I heard the first allusion to purgatory in a Roman Catholic sermon that I have heard without using the word for a very long time. (It could be that I did not listen to funeral sermons carefully before this one.) I was interested by the implication that the person might not be in heaven. But me being me I was not alarmed, I went off to the Wait wait What? to read current doctrine of the Roman Catholic church. Every thought, idea, law and religious doctrine exists on the WWW somewhere and it exists for any religious philosophy.

There is a YouTube video for the reading challenged at www.catholic.com that tells all. Reserve an hour or so if you are interested. I have got to admit that the current view of purgatory is much different than what I got from reading the catechism and listening to the Sisters of Mercy seventy years ago.

I have misunderstood the difference of “praying for” and “praying to” for many years. Today I read this: “… prayers for the dead: “In doing this (offering a sacrifice) he (Judas Maccabee) acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the dead to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin” (2 Macc. 12:43–45). Prayers are not needed by those in heaven, and no one can help those in hell…”

There is an in-between state (Limbo of the Fathers, Purgatory, Sanctification) and those souls we pray for. Souls in heaven do not need prayer. They are there. They are sanctified. They are prayed to. Souls in hell (damnation) are lost and cannot be helped. That is sad. The distinction was lost on me when I was six years old and I was not interested enough to ask. Catholic philosophy is laden with guilt and I did not seek out more of it by asking the nun to compare and contrast for and to.

As for me, I prefer to sit near the back of any church. It is a fine old Catholic tradition that if you get in early you can sit in the back. Cheryl liked to sit midway up and to the left side. After her death I sit near the rear and to the right. I can look at the other side of her. I see her often in church, any church, when I am there.

Family is mostly what I thought about during her funeral after I made a mental note to educate myself about the concept of purgatory. Two of my children sat with me. We did not stay for the reception in the church hall afterward. Cheryl’s death is too fresh for all of us.

Cheryl… when she died I was sad and happy… She was better at religion than I was and am now. I think women are better at religion. It is odd, I think, that men are in charge of them, all of them. I was sad that she was gone from my life and I felt that here in church at Teri’s funeral.

Cheryl came to me in an early morning dream a few months ago. It is incredibly vivid in my memory, as though I had lived though it. In the dream there was a special service in our church – Nativity. For some unclear reason we had to bring our own chairs to the service – a mass as I remember it. At the end of the service she hoped up and announced to me that she had to go. I can hear her, “I have to go!” I thought she meant to the lady’s room. She was in the midst of her Parkinson’s and with that her memory and spacial issues. She could not always find her way around. In this instance she was moving with ease towards the lavatory door which was around the corner and out of my sight as she moved through the crowd of folks leaving the service. I waited anxiously near our chairs gathering our stuff up to leave. I looked in her direction often to be sure she would make her way back. She often was unsure of where she was, so, I was worried. She was gone a long time and as I began to move towards the lady’s room a young man came up to me and asked if he could help with the chairs. He explained that Cheryl was gone.(He said, “She’s not coming back. She’ll be okay.) It is a very vivid memory/dream and I cry whenever I recall it. She is in heaven. This is what I take her last visit to me in this dream to mean.

I am happy for her because she was no longer suffering from Parkinson’s scourge that took her from this life and my life. I am happy that I can pray to her.

Carpe Diem