Category Archives: death

Callas and Comfort

March 30, 2016death, family, love, quotescalla lilies, cemeteries, comfort, Second Coming of Christ, snowball bushGretchenJoanna

gl calla bouquet 3-16 P1030732 When we broke up and filled in the swimming pool last summer, the surrounding planting beds were also excavated and new dirt was brought in for the new plants to grow in. In one corner where calla lilies had grown for a decade, we put in native California currant bushes.

Then the callas sprouted again, up through the little blooming ribes. I’ve had to go out every few days and yank out perfectly healthy lilies when they start to encroach too closely around the young plants that I am trying to encourage.

One morning last week when my daughters and I were packing up to visit the cemetery and have a picnic afterward, we discussed going to t P1030837 he store to buy some flowers to lay on their father’s grave, because I said I didn’t have any flowers in the yard to take.

I suppose I was thinking about how the snowball bush didn’t yet have any flowers ready to pick. Last year at this time it was loaded with flowers, and one reason I did not take out the old thing was that I anticipated having its beautiful blooms to put on my husband’s grave every March. snowballs crp 15

Well, I had forgotten the calla lilies! Brave and hardy plants that keep coming…. We picked plenty to take to the cemetery, and since then have had more in vases in which they seem to fall naturally into elegant arrangements.

As you can see, we had other home-grown flowers to use — a few surviving ranunculus from the front yard, and even a Bird of Paradise from Pearl’s garden. Several freesia blooms were left after their extravagant display a couple of weeks ago. Scout and Ivy helped by decorating their grandpa’s grave, and their father drew us together by reading these words:

gl grave 3-16 P1030745

For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38-39)

Just now I’m reminded of another passage from I Thessalonians, which is also about our togetherness in the Lord (and it ties in nicely with my “C” post):

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.

I will not stop here.

November 15, 2015death, grief, poetryThomas DooleyGretchenJoanna

PASSAGE

And there was evening, humid
with lightning, when my father

fell to the earth like summer hail,
scattered. I gathered

my mother, we threw in
a handful of pebbles. And

there was morning, bitterly.
There was evening news

bluing walls, violet morning
on thunderheads, and the evening

when morning
would never again light our bodies in bed.

Morning caravans, headlights,
evening. A long caravan of evenings. Then

there was only me, morning. Awake in a room
in a building vast with rooms. Everyone

evening. Everyone morning. And God
had finished all the work he had been doing—

babies, honeybees, spreadsheets, winter
mornings. I said,

I will not stop here, evening. I’ll see you
in the morning.

–Thomas Dooley

I slip on the downside of Fall.

November 8, 2015death, grief, nature, quotesautumn, koliva, pyracantha, WaterlogueGretchenJoanna

Waterlogue-2015-11-08-20-02-54 berries — pyracantha on path (Waterlogue)

Only a couple of days ago I was in love with the season and my new plants and all. Then last night, as I was airily driving to Vespers, suddenly it descended like a solid black cloud, the realization that I would not have my beloved companion with me this year. The days are cooler and damper and one can take a walk at any time of day and it will be pleasant, but he will not be here to share the delights of the season with.

Today I took a walk alone, as I will have to do more often now, trying to hold on to what is left of me. I hoped the exercise would improve my weepy mood, and I thought I might take some pictures with my phone, because that urge is something of me that remains, and it’s not overly challenging work.

Waterlogue-2015-11-08-19-59-19 leaves — turning leaves

The change in me is one of the griefs that is so disturbing. I don’t only miss my husband, my companion of 45 years, but I miss my very life, because it is changed at several levels. I know in faith, and even by the evidence of the recent months, that God’s plans for me are good, but now I feel the down side of the season’s changes in the way they mark the progress through the cycles of the years and seasons of life, and make me feel the sting of change and decay.

Last night I saw a photo slide past on my screen saver, set to shuffle family pictures, a snapshot taken of my husband when he was just a little boy on the beach, looking serene and calm. He didn’t know then that his life would speed up year by year, that he was racing toward the grave. I was stunned and angry. He comes forth like a flower, and is cut down: he flees also as a shadow, and continues not. (Job 14:2)

GL P1020633

The memorial service for which I made the koliva was also last night, just before Vespers, right after I was hit by the black cloud. As I served up little cups of the boiled wheat dish in the narthex several of us were remarking on how we can’t keep track of the passage of time; what year was it that Sarah reposed? We need help to remember, and to remember the things that we ought. It’s good for us to have these services and to pray for the dead partly because it reminds us that our own death is coming, and we should live in light of that.

IMG_0917 2015-11-08 — Neighbor Elizabeth’s front yard

To remind myself of the realities that have sustained me through the last months, I spent some time this morning looking through the blog posts I have written since my husband’s death. I was surprised to find that the comments from you readers were the most comforting words to read, because you have suffered with me via my blog and have prayed for and affirmed me through everything. I wanted to write a private e-mail to so many of you, but I decided to write this post instead. Writing is a way for me to tame my wild thoughts and feelings as I organize them and put them into a perspective that is in tune with Truth, and the love of The Holy Trinity.

Several “real life” friends learned of my extra sorrow today. I received hugs and phone calls and e-mails, and prayers. I know that many of you pray for me often, and that is heartening. I ask my husband to pray for me too, as I know that in reality he is not far away, no matter how I may feel in the moment. Thank you all, for reading my blog, for praying. Thank you, God, for everything.

For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
(II Timothy 1:7)

This man lived and made me love him.

June 24, 2015church, deathkoliva, memorials, Met. Anthony Bloom, prayer for the deadGretchenJoanna

Today marks three months since my husband fell asleep in the Lord. I recently learned that P1000485 in the Orthodox Church a memorial service is often held at three months (as we did at 40 days), and because we also are commemorating The Nativity of St. John the Baptist today, it was convenient to have these prayers right after the Liturgy. I made koliva again but decorated it a little differently.

I like what Metropolitan Anthony Bloom wrote on the subject of prayer for the dead:

What does it mean to pray for the dead? Are we asking the Lord to act unjustly? Certainly not. By our prayer, we bear witness that the dead have not lived in vain. We show that as well as the many worthless things they did in their lives, they also sowed the seed of charity. We pray for them with love and gratitude; we remember their presence among us. And our prayer for them must be supported by our lives. If we do not bear fruit in our lives of what the dead have taught us, our prayer for them will be feeble indeed. We must be able to say, “Lord, Lord, this man lived and made me love him, he gave me examples to follow and I follow them.” The day will come when we shall be able to say, “The good that you see in my life is not mine; he gave me it, take it and let it be this for his glory, perhaps for his forgiveness….”

The life o P1000496crp f each one of us does not end at death on this earth and birth into heaven. We place a seal on everyone we meet. This responsibility continues after death, and the living are related to the dead for whom they pray. In the dead we no longer belong completely to the world; in us the dead still belong to history. Prayer for the dead is vital; it expresses the totality of our common life.