Spinach???
In a salad - okay
But
from a can - the one Popeye used to think gave him strength?
Not
a chance
In
fact, there's a box of frozen spinach in my freezer. I didn't pay enough
attention when I was purchasing for ingredients for a Happy Birthday broccoli casserole
for my son in law, Dale. Who knows why I
didn’t take it back to Publix?
Back
to the Spinach
One
of my favorite Ray Parker Thanksgiving messages was about his mother
encouraging him to eat his spinach so that he could have the chocolate cake
that was for dessert. His point - sometimes we have to experience bad
before we can appreciate the good
The
lives of me and my children and Ray Parker became an excellent example of that
(Romans 8:28)
But
that’s all in the past
In
many ways, I feel like I have experienced way too much bad this year. I've
been pretty noisy about events in my life between April 21 and July 15. I
lost two uncles, had a vehicle accident that not only totaled my ride but caused
me to have a brain bleed. My siblings and I determined that our mother
needed to be under Hospice care in early June. She went to be with the
Lord and our daddy on July 5 and on July 12 I tested positive for Covid.
I
remembered the words from Uncle Howard's eulogy when Rich Suhey died (24 years
ago "but who's counting?). He pulled a line from an Ink Spots song “Into
each life some rain must fall, but too much is falling in mine". The
aforementioned Ink Spots were an American pop vocal group who gained international fame in the 1930s
and 1940s.
It has felt like so many things have happened in my life (and
the lives of those I love like my siblings our children our aunts and our
cousins).
I loved that dark green Honda Accord. Somehow it
reminded me of the dark green Jaguar that Rich Suhey bought just four months
before his death. I have been more upset over the loss of that car than I was with the
fact that I had a brain injury. Besides, it was a minor bleed.
My mother had been such a dear friend in my life. She
never minded helping me get on the right road when I was feeling sorry for
myself. She always had a solution (even when I didn't ask for one).
Although our relationship had changed as I became the parent (which she disliked
vehemently) I look back on our relationship with much thanksgiving. While
I am relieved that she is no longer in a state of confusion, I still feel a
great void at my loss.
After months of waiting for the right vehicle, I am the owner
of a Honda CRV with much thanks to my son-in-law, Dale.
And because of the loss of my mother, I attended a Grief
Share Group that has been so very helpful. As I participated, I realized
that in the last two years I had experienced other deaths that I had not really
grieved - my brother at the end of 2020 and my children’s dad in the middle of 2021. Through Grief Share, I have identified that while my most recent loss is my mother, my
most devastating loss is my husband, Rich
Both of them were very dear friends
I just knew I would never have a friend who was as dear to me
as Rich - and most people know that thanks to my friend, Burt Wasamund, I interviewed
and wrote a story about the President of the Mandarin Cemetery Board and somehow,
I have a new best friend
He doesn't like canned spinach either!
May your life have enough sunshine,
To make you appreciate the shadows
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