Magic

Magic: an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a natural source

This is a picture of me holding my mom's hand before she passed away.  I knew she was getting closer to the end of her physical journey here on earth but holding her hand made me feel like I was home.  At this point of her illness with Alzheimer's verbal communication  was very minimal.  She was aware of my presence but did not speak.  Prayer was our connection to each other.  Our own little world consisted of singing the rosary. She would respond to me and why wouldn't she?  After all, my parents were the people responsible for keeping faith in my heart alive, they planted the seed, nurtured it and watched it bloom.  So holding her hand was like magic.  Mama had that magical power to make me feel safe.  So it is my belief and my hope that me holding her hand was a way of reminding mama of her magic for me.

Now holding the hands of my grandchildren I often feel their magic.  Their trust is given freely whenever they hold my hand and immediately my heart smiles.  

If I am fortunate enough,  I hope that if need be,  one day they will remind me of my magic. 

Hope

Half a century and entering the autumn of my life.  Funny I don't feel that old but when I look in the mirror the grey hairs and "some" wrinkles stare back. But in my eyes I see the little girl I still am.  Still having that child like ability to fly. Lately, I have had some people close to me get some disheartening news about their loved ones.   Each one will travel a different path but most likely they will meet at some point. We all will.  Since time has passed since I too was trying to adapt to the news of my parents' final journey I am trying to do my best to remember what helped and what did not.  I do know it was extremely helpful when people would just listen to me and let me vent. But also, it was those who also fed me hope.  They would share with me their stories, their journeys and they are still standing, still breathing, still living.  Their stories gave me hope.   Hope got me through.

I am not afraid. Why? Because my parents were travelers on this path too and have found that eternal vacation spot.  This is what I choose to believe.  In my mind I don't believe that they or their essence just ended.  Nope, no way, never.  Then I think about our beginnings...when we are born.  We as human have some understanding of when life begins.  But what about the actual person.... when did they begin? At conception?  Hmmmm... Me, I believe we existed sometime before we chose to be here or were given our actual existence in this life at our birth and when our time here is finished we continue the journey somewhere else.  Our life story may be ended but not our essence, our soul, our spirit... we can't just be finished.

So, we come to my post of HOPE.  When my dad was on his ventilator and the docs were saying nothing more could be done I had to make the decision. Then the nurse in the room said to me, "right now God is preparing a room in his house for dad" and with those simple words I knew it was ok.

So my point.

never give up
never surrender

because there is more to us then meets our eye