It
has already been a most unusual summer, filled with emotional highs and lows,
beginnings and endings that have provoked feelings in me I want to incorporate
into my writing but haven’t worked through the process of finding where they
belong in my own life yet, let alone on a page. In writing about them now, I thought
about parceling them out―separating the ups from the downs ―but I experienced
them together and will try to share them in that way.
I
finished a personal journey in June which took more than three decades when I
graduated from college (finally!). It was a buoyant weekend and I was blessed
to be surrounded by friends and family, people I truly love who were lovely
enough to share the overwhelming experience with me. Even in all the joy that
surrounded me I felt a shadow of sadness that my parents were not physically
present but I did feel them with me since I always carry them in my heart. This
ending gives way to preparation for another beginning: my Master's program begins August 1!
As
I was getting ready to visit much of the same family last week to attend a
family wedding, my sister called to tell me one of the nicest people I have
ever known had died. We graduated from high school together and she was absolutely
the quintessential All-American girl. Always smiling, Homecoming Queen,
outstanding senior girl and you didn’t hate her for it! She was the type of
person you could not see for ten years but still feel her warmth and kindness
the minute you embraced her again. I do not live in my hometown any longer but
would be visiting at the time of her service so I could attend. I didn’t. I
couldn’t wrap my head or my heart around saying good-bye to someone my own age.
The coincidences of life threw me into the path of members of her extended
family and former classmates at the mall of all places as well as the
long-awaited family wedding. Remembering her life and talking of her death
under the white canopies ringing the dance floor where my darling niece and her
new husband danced was bittersweet. Her ending and their beginning dovetailed
under the stars, each breaking my heart in a different way.
Just
as summer isn’t over, neither is the emotional riptide it has brought. My
nephew’s wife is expecting their first child. She generously let me place my
hand on her lovely rounded tummy and feel him kick at dinner one night. I am
going back up in a week to attend baby showers, ready to welcome the pulse of a
new life into the family. Two weeks later, we will get together again to
celebrate a beloved aunt’s 90th birthday.
I
know this ebb and flow has a place in my writing and I am anxious to find it,
just as soon as I find its place in my life.
