This morning I jotted off a quick email to a lady named Carol and her husband, John. I wanted them to know that I remembered that today was my friend Margaret's birthday. And that I missed her.
Margaret was John's mother. She died three years ago, scant hours after John emailed me a gracious invitation to pass a message to his mom before she slipped beyond reach. I frantically returned a note of love and gratitude, and I know John delivered it. But his email shook me.
The last time I saw Margaret in her Campbell River home, I found her as vibrant and vivacious as most Scotswomen half her age. She wore a flaming red sweater that complemented her raven hair. In her cozily cluttered kitchen, she served up five-inch thick lasagna. She spoke of spring blooms, and she sent me packing with gifts; hand-knitted slippers for the Beans, and a rock she'd painted to resemble a thatched cottage. Carrying it home stretched my arm by a good half-inch, I swear. It holds our bedroom door back today.
Life only gives you one Margaret, I thought, when John told me she'd gone. And now it's over. I felt bereft, as though someone has snipped off a corner of me.
In my email today, I told Carol that I was glad God put Margaret on this earth while we could share it with her. I said I'm looking forward to meeting her again at some wonderful nook in heaven, where we'll have MUCH catching up to do.
Carol's response, which I never expected, told me that just yesterday her family travelled to Margaret's old home to visit her ocean-front memorial on the seaside walk, where she and her grandson shared precious time watching Alaska-bound ships glide by. John planted heather there, she said, in honor of his mom's beloved childhood Scotland home. Their son placed a piece of driftwood beside it. Smooth old ocean-battered wood, like the pieces he often collected on walks with his Nan. They hope, Carol said, that "as the heather grows it will cover the driftwood, wrapping itself around it."
I'm not sure why I'm writing about Margaret today. Perhaps I have on my mind people like the Preacher, who in the last two months has lost two siblings in their fifties. And many of you, whose recent losses have shaved your souls thin. The valley of the shadow, while you're walking it, feels often as though God himself has vanished.
Being intentional about remembering our departed loved ones is vital to the healing of the soul. Though it hurts, do it, even if it takes you to a sea wall to plant heather. But believers in Christ can also hold close Carol's last words. "Someday there will be a large reunion and that knowledge does give strength to face losses or challenges. Our Redeemer lives and gives life to our hope."
Amen.
