Good bye to Carol's Mom

Around my heart this question goes,
Where it stops nobody knows....

How does a person live on when their mother dies-
Who will understand their deepest heart cries?

How will they pick up the phone for a call
or want to just talk-for no reason at all?

Who's left to tell them the story of their birth
or remind them when down, of their value and worth?

Why is the whole world still functioning well
When the issues of Life are of heaven and hell?

Death creeps in silently, we knew it would come
Why do my cumbersome feet want to run?

Run from the sorrow
Run from the pain
Run to the sunshine and
out of this rain.

Run to the Savior
Who knew I'd be sad
Run to His arms
He's all that I had

From the moment of birth
to the second of death
He is all that I have
He's all that is left.


Written upon hearing of the death of my friend Carol's Mother, a precious friend and woman of God. February 27, 2009 with Jesus.

This woman is also the great grandmother of my twin grandchildren Evelyn and Aidan Lacock.

Celebrating Surprises

I had made plans with some single gals at work for Valentine's Day night. We would get together and then eat a quick dinner,laugh and have fun and see a movie, forgetting completely(hey!not even caring!!) we didn't have a real date or someone making us lobster tails or lavishing flowers on us. I was stoked. The date was marked, plans confirmed, time ticking forward and at last the BIG WEEK was here. I told my kids I couldn't babysit because, of course, I had plans.

Two of these newly discovered friends, soon to be plain co-workers, said they were not really feeling up to a night out. That's OK , I valiantly told them, there are three others of us to be together. Two more told me a bar could be fun, even dancing on the tabletops was all right by them. I knew I was in trouble, so casually mentioned I don't drink nor do I dance well on a floor, let alone a tabletop. We parted plans there.

But, not to be discouraged, I had one more friend who said that no matter what happened, she and I were going out. I could still claim to have a life!! I would not even think about romance and ridiculous sentiments, I was ready.

Friday morning I was informed that this friend of mine, potential soul mate, budding buddy, would be too tired from helping out her yet closer friend move houses, so she decided to back out. Wham. The woman who loves love and Valentine's Day was to be alone, scratching out the datebook plans, not babysitting for her children's children, having nothing to do but sit. I suppose there are television shows to watch and facebook people to stalk, but really, I had been in the mood to live a little.

Saturday morning brought sunshine in my hallway window, so immediately, if I was an omen believer in-er , I would say this was a good sign. I read my Through the Bible in a year chapter book, enjoying that the laws of Moses were not to be troubled by anymore, but that I could just be thankful we are freed from them by grace.

I totally savored to the fullest my first cup of coffee, hot from the percolator and doctored exactly right with my fat free vanilla International creamer. I think the creamer was made and distributed in Colorado, so why do they insist on making it sound so exotic? For losers like me who don't have Valentine's dates and whose husbands left them and who haven't travelled internationally in several decades? Hmmm?? I ask you, why not call it , Cow's Creamer? America's Moo Milk with flavoring?? Well, I digress, so back to my point.

The phone rang around 10:00 am and as I picked it up I wondered what could be better than the feeling I had of peacefully sipping my coffee and having a 4 day weekend ahead? Daughter Becca, asking me to go shopping with baby grandson and granddaughter, that's what! I was delighted to meet them, laugh at the latest antics and then lunch together. How could Valentine's Day be any better?







The phone rang again almost as soon as I placed the receiver on the hook. (Or, does anyone use that saying with cell phones and portable phones anymore?) I am so old.

A tiny little voice, barely audible, was saying something that started with "Grammy, hi it's me, Simon." He then politely asked me to please come to dinner and share the 'red meal' with them !! Oh my, things were looking up and the day had barely begun. Of course, I calmly said "yes, Simon, I can come over, what time?", all the while my insides shouting "Yay!!!!! I have plans and they don't involve work and they are with people who I know love me!!"



The afternoon fairly flew by as I shopped and chased two little people around stores, looking for red gifts to carry along to my supper engagement. Red is the color of choice, you understand. I found pajama pants for the boys, under $3.00 each and pink heart sweatshirts for the little girls. When I arrived at their house I made a trade-they sit for a picture, I give them a bag of goodies. It worked.








When I arrived back home, my mail was in my box, and as if life could not get any better, there was a pink envelope and a squishy package!! I am so not kidding, isn't God wonderfully kind to me??!! I had a Valentine gift from my special west coast friend Becky, who, although half my age and who has never really had a relationship that involved face to face talking with me, continues to lavish me with love that is a sweet reflection of God's love for me.

[OK, that was a run-on sentence, ask Rachel my English teacher daughter who also called me and said those precious words "Happy Valentine's Day, mom, I love you", earlier in this glorious day I am relaying]

I feel as though it is a direct gift from God each time Becky reaches out to me in love. My pink card was from a church friend who is starting to know who I really am, and not the person who co-workers think they have figured out.

Well, lest I bore the 2 people that might be reading this blog, my evening was hilariously perfect, concluding with dinner and children who not only can balance a spoon on their noses, but who listen intently whenever I tell a story, then when asked who their favorite person to love is , say Grammy with NO bribing involved whatsoever!!



Have I mentioned I love that thing called Love??

That thing called Love

Every season that could possibly be celebrated with decorations or mini garden flags or cards or parties, is sure to be in my basement storage bin labeled appropriately. The next time of celebration approaches and I am scurrying down to the cellar and yanking out boxes, replacing the new with the old.Out go the snowmen, in come the hearts.

My favorite, however, is the February 14Th holiday referred to as Valentine's Day. I LOVE this holiday! I love everything about it- the cheesy, the romantic, the stupid, the fun, the red and white, the hearts and flowers, the gushy commercials on TV and the sweet valentines received from children and grandchildren. This year I am sure to also receive silly painted hearts or folded heart snowflakes from a classroom of first and second graders. I will love them each one with proper oohing and aahing.



When my kids were little it always amused me to figure out how to squeeze the most from Valentine's Day. I always made a completely red meal, of course, varying year to year as the creative mommy mind went crazy. Raspberry jello, spaghetti with meatballs or heart shaped pizza. Perhaps we'd have beef stroganoff(my mom's recipe has a red sauce), strawberry shortcake or Hawaiian punch to drink.What fun it was showing my children how much I loved them and the fun things of life!!


We always began saving our shoe boxes around the end of the previous year in order to ensure that there would be enough boxes to make our card collectors for each child. Then I would call or ask family,friends and church people to send them all(7! please,each separate) a card for the box they labored so eagerly over. It cost nothing, it rewarded them with the feeling of being loved and cared for. How can we not like that tradition? It was so strongly embedded in my heart that last week I saved 2 big old Folger's containers and painted them for the twins A and E to put Valentines in. There are 8 other grandchildren, but I didn't quite drink enough coffee this year and I sure have no shoe boxes lying around! Now, of course, my mailbox will be buzzing as I send Valentine cards to each one.

I love making people feel loved and cared about. I love the feeling of someone having a brighter day by opening their email inbox or outdoor mailbox and discovering an unexpected envelope.

" Hmmm, I wasn't expecting anything from them, I didn't give them anything to need a thank you. I'll bet it's an invitation to some stupid party...hmmm, nope, it's just a note. Wow, They must like me. How cool, I can smile at them and know I've been thought about by someone" Isn't that a good feeling?

Love is such a warm feeling, such a blanket of protection against the chill of winter and the coldness of the rat race we live in. Love reminds me that I am valuable , I am worth something, I am OK. Love is like the bunch of bushes against the side of my house and there, amongst the greenish brown is a bright red berry. It just jumps out with it's vibrancy and color. I love that berry!!I love walking in a winter wood and finding a spot of color popping out to brighten the path! I want friends to feel that way when they think of me, when they get a silly card or note or email.



Love is also very melodious, like my wind chimes tinkling in the wind today, letting me know they are hanging there guarding the entryway, but not really bothering me with their insistent clanging. I just like the feeling of hearing them occasionally banging against each other gently.

Love is also really fragrant when it is expressed well. The smell of a newborn baby in the first moments of life, the smell of someone just after a shower, the fragrance of your mother's favorite Muguet des Bois perfume, or your dad's Old Spice.
When I am loved by someone, whether a friend or son or daughter or neighbor, it smells good when they approach. There is way too much stench in this world, I like celebrating the smells of love. Think Chocolate.

My kitchen table currently has on it 10 white bags, fruit snacks to one side, heart candies piled high, waiting to be placed lovingly into those white bags. What else can I place in them to show my little baby grandchildren how much I love them? Words spoken each time I see them is never enough. I can leave no legacy more valuable to them then the certainty that this Grammy adored them!

Eliot, Simon, Jesse, Nora, Bianca, Isabel, Ava, Ethan, Aidan and Evelyn are my treasures of love, my gift of love from my Heavenly Father. He told me that He loved me , For God so loved the world(me) that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever(me) believes in Him shall have eternal life! Wow.

He proves that He loves me daily by giving me so many good gifts. I can never count them all, but I do count the many children and grandchildren as the most important, felt by me as the strongest proof gift.

His fragrance washes over me when I am so chilled and weary of the life struggles and circumstances that threaten to sink my ship. Some mornings when I first wake up, I sit and just smell the outside air, then come inside and smell my coffee brewing in the kitchen, and I think "God must love me alot to allow me these fragrances". No kidding.

God's Love involves all of my senses, He misses nothing, He expects nothing, He gives everything. I love Him because He first loved me- unbelievably true and wonderful!

Well, Valentine's Hearts and cards,flowers, candies and parties cannot really come close to God's love, but it certainly can be an easy way for me to express my love to my loved ones! Have I mentioned I love that thing called love?

February the first

Twenty five years ago today an event occurred that very few of my everyday current circle of friends knows happened. My heart is usually worn on my sleeve, as the saying goes, and so not much about me is unknown. I am the type of person who wonders how people keep secrets or what the secrets could even be, since my life is rather an open book with only a couple of chapters I wish had been ripped out, rather than read. My life is blessed with people of all shapes and sizes, from several nationalities and races, young and old, opinionated and shy thrown together, all under the name of friend. To each friend I give unrestricted access of my heart.

That makes the day even more perplexing to me. The area of February 1, 1984 isn't a secret , just a wound. When I woke up this morning, 25 years forward in the passage of time, it was as if I had flashed back on a time machine and instantly felt that familiar stab of pain. The pain of loss, the pain of excruciating emptiness and shock. The pain of not thinking the world could possibly be turning on it's axle since mine was spinning out of control. That pain especially cruel in it's lonely factor, having lost my husband who experienced this event with me to a different catastrophic loss of his own choosing, in 2001.

Several days ago I had been pretty sure that the date would mean nothing to me this year. After all, I am in my 5Th decade of life and I had only been a young , immature 34 years of age then and had experienced much weariness of soul and mind already in my young life: the rejection of Brazilian relatives, the heart aches that come with living thousands of miles from family, a miscarriage, a husband working full time while going to graduate school full time as I cared for our 5 young children, living in the poverty half of the economic graph- things life hands you while you live it.

Daniel Mark Ribeiro stopped breathing and living while sleeping in his bed that night. He was 9 1/2 months of cuteness and sweetness. He was our 5Th baby, our unexpected gift while going to graduate school, our growth in grace. Danny was well loved and adored by his siblings and occupied a good portion of our time and life. He was handicapped,near-sighted to the point of near blindness and incredibly off track in developmental milestones. We had learned and used tracheotomy care, as he breathed through a hole in his neck, and he was fed through a nasal tube. The paraphernalia necessary for his daily care filled our station wagon where the other 4 kids were not sitting.

When he stopped breathing on February the first, those many years ago, friends rallied around in full support mode. He had made a quick and lasting impact on many people, Seminarians and neighbors alike. People gravitated to him before they turned to the 'normal' four children, hugging him, cooing and commenting on his brightness factor, his clever smile, his latest accomplishment. Our pediatrician drove to our home at 6:00 am to field the ambulance and coroner issues and stayed with us until the friend circle arrived. He had loved Danny as well.

Daniel was born on April 11, 1983 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to a single mom named Tracy, who had learning and emotional issues of her own. She had considered aborting him when she discovered he had flaws, but was convinced by the pro-life community that they would help her, and they did. However, when it was time for Danny to be placed from the hospital in the chosen home for him, the new parents couldn't handle the pressure of the unknown. They preferred a healthy child and so there he laid, snugly wrapped and screaming(that was one of his preferred methods of communicating)in his yellow cap. I have that cap, having just felt and smelled it again today.

Hearing that he was an undesired baby due to his handicaps infuriated my husband and I, [remember we were young and not tamed by maturity? ] so we drove that very afternoon for 6 hours to pick him up. We told the social worker we were pro-life, no matter how that played out.She gladly handed his screaming body to us, saying the paperwork would come the following week. Things have changed in that regard over the years, I am sure, but God's Hand of grace moved well in our favor.

Danny came home with us to his four siblings and there he planted himself until February 1st, the following year. Paul, Becca, Margie and Rachel all loved him thoroughly and completely, never even bothered that he was fed or breathed differently.

His loss was felt greatly by his brother and sisters as well as us. His memorial service was attended by many and his short life accomplished what many people never accomplish- making friends consider options for their own family planning methods, adoption and birth choices.

Time, with the gift of tears.

I feel better today, having blogged about my long ago and far away baby boy. I wish my current friends had known him and had the chance to even know me then, the young, spontaneous, foolish mother who knew that God can help us with anything. I am a little older, a little wiser, a little more outspoken and alot more in love with God and trusting Him more.

I loved Danny then and I miss him now. I am proudly pro-life and it colors every decision I make in politics and life. May God be merciful as our country continues to find people dispensable. The Old, as well as the youngest ones, are definitely valuable Keepers.