september 5
It was hot on the morning we stood facing rows and rows of white gravestones on the field where she was buried, just a lean year ago. Clutching a bouquet of deep pink roses and orange lilies-- our family's pick-- I instructed the kids in how to fill the plastic vase with water from the tap. Nathanael swatted at his feet and began to complain about the heat. It was sweltering.
Steve walked ahead as I searched my bag for a knife to cut the bottoms of the stems. My mind was fixed on the next thing, as I am used to doing. Not finding a knife, I gathered the girls together and we walked through the dirt patch that would soon become grass-filled and occupied by other gravestones. It was oddly silent.
Nothing distinguished one marker from the next, unless you slowed down enough the read the carefully engraved names, dates and pithy remembrances. Here was a retired Colonel, a war veteran and beloved father; there, a wife and mother, possibly killed in Iraq combat; here, a son.
Now here, a beloved daughter. Our Evelyn Grace, "held in the arms of Jesus."
Flowers had been placed next to her grave, probably by the cemetary and a stench arose from the decaying stems. We carefully emptied the vase and poured in fresh water with our new bouquet. The kids laid their flowers in front of the grave.
We had not planned on what to do, to say, other than to place the flowers, but Steve now opened his Bible. Psalm 139, "Lord, you have searched me and you know me..." He reads on, his voice cracking.
I stare at the rows of stones, like bright teeth gleaming in the sunshine. I feel nothing in these, nothing of the pain or hope or life I once held that day a year ago. Her body lies below the newly sodded ground, wrapped up with her pink blanket and stuffed lamb, but even that is just a shell.
I look up at the clouds, layers upon layers of brilliance. The cemetary is set on acres of flatland dotted with live oaks, truly a serene setting. But is this more for us, who need to find some connection, some way to remember, when the memories become dim?
Earlier that morning, I sat in bed with my journal, scratching words onto the page about her, to her. It is hard to believe that a year has passed since I brought her, unmoving, into a world where her body would be ushered away so soon. We had precious hours to be with her, light feather of a thing, before she was gone. No chance to really make memories, though we had months with her in the shelter of my body.
What is there to remember, to commemorate? Or to mourn? I feel the swell of my belly now and the kicks of this new life we have been afforded.
"Maybe you've moved on," Steve says later, when I struggle over not feeling. While he read the psalm, tears streaming, I stood quietly, puzzling over her grave. Abigail ran and wove around the stones, grabbing plastic flowers and trampling over the fresh ones we had just put down. Our son, the most easily overheated one, voiced loudly his discomfort at being there.
We took turns kneeling in front of the grave. When it was my turn, I felt like I was acting in a movie-- doing what I was supposed to do, putting my hand on the grave and being silent. Yet I had no connection to that signpost, to that place. I yearned to be in my room, with my pen, writing about her brief life and my love for her. That is where I can remember best and feel closest to her.
Yet coming here, to Bushnell National Cemetary, was important-- like all ceremonies, graduations, parades, recitals. Perhaps it is a visual, tangible sense of what we are remembering or the experience of coming together as a family.
I know that she has not been forgotten, even as this new little seed of a child is forming inside me. She has a different name (not chosen yet!) and a different place in our hearts.
Evelyn Grace, we will remember you always, our beloved child. Your life, though brief, changed our lives forever. Our hearts are quieted knowing that you are truly safe in the arms of Jesus.
soli deo gloria!
Steve walked ahead as I searched my bag for a knife to cut the bottoms of the stems. My mind was fixed on the next thing, as I am used to doing. Not finding a knife, I gathered the girls together and we walked through the dirt patch that would soon become grass-filled and occupied by other gravestones. It was oddly silent.
Nothing distinguished one marker from the next, unless you slowed down enough the read the carefully engraved names, dates and pithy remembrances. Here was a retired Colonel, a war veteran and beloved father; there, a wife and mother, possibly killed in Iraq combat; here, a son.
Now here, a beloved daughter. Our Evelyn Grace, "held in the arms of Jesus."
Flowers had been placed next to her grave, probably by the cemetary and a stench arose from the decaying stems. We carefully emptied the vase and poured in fresh water with our new bouquet. The kids laid their flowers in front of the grave.
We had not planned on what to do, to say, other than to place the flowers, but Steve now opened his Bible. Psalm 139, "Lord, you have searched me and you know me..." He reads on, his voice cracking.
I stare at the rows of stones, like bright teeth gleaming in the sunshine. I feel nothing in these, nothing of the pain or hope or life I once held that day a year ago. Her body lies below the newly sodded ground, wrapped up with her pink blanket and stuffed lamb, but even that is just a shell.
I look up at the clouds, layers upon layers of brilliance. The cemetary is set on acres of flatland dotted with live oaks, truly a serene setting. But is this more for us, who need to find some connection, some way to remember, when the memories become dim?
Earlier that morning, I sat in bed with my journal, scratching words onto the page about her, to her. It is hard to believe that a year has passed since I brought her, unmoving, into a world where her body would be ushered away so soon. We had precious hours to be with her, light feather of a thing, before she was gone. No chance to really make memories, though we had months with her in the shelter of my body.
What is there to remember, to commemorate? Or to mourn? I feel the swell of my belly now and the kicks of this new life we have been afforded.
"Maybe you've moved on," Steve says later, when I struggle over not feeling. While he read the psalm, tears streaming, I stood quietly, puzzling over her grave. Abigail ran and wove around the stones, grabbing plastic flowers and trampling over the fresh ones we had just put down. Our son, the most easily overheated one, voiced loudly his discomfort at being there.
We took turns kneeling in front of the grave. When it was my turn, I felt like I was acting in a movie-- doing what I was supposed to do, putting my hand on the grave and being silent. Yet I had no connection to that signpost, to that place. I yearned to be in my room, with my pen, writing about her brief life and my love for her. That is where I can remember best and feel closest to her.
Yet coming here, to Bushnell National Cemetary, was important-- like all ceremonies, graduations, parades, recitals. Perhaps it is a visual, tangible sense of what we are remembering or the experience of coming together as a family.
I know that she has not been forgotten, even as this new little seed of a child is forming inside me. She has a different name (not chosen yet!) and a different place in our hearts.
Evelyn Grace, we will remember you always, our beloved child. Your life, though brief, changed our lives forever. Our hearts are quieted knowing that you are truly safe in the arms of Jesus.
soli deo gloria!
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