here's to you...

Silence overwhelms me…. And that probably explains my fear of death. To never speak another word, to never be heard again. As I grow older, death has become more and more a part of my life….and each time I feel it creep closer and closer to me. I feel like I am living on borrowed time. I love so fiercely and fervently that part of my fear when faced with the reality of death is the idea that I will leave a loved one in pain. Someone will feel the loss that I have felt much too often when someone I love is taken much too soon. The physical pain that rips at my heart is the most undeserving feeling I have yet known to feel. To fully explain would take too long because the words I could never accurately find.



As far back as I remember I have been haunted by this one dream. There I stand looking over my own lifeless body. The wind blowing leaves all over the place and nothing looks familiar to me. Confused, unaware, numbed by disbelief. I stare at my own face. Then somewhere in the distance, I hear my mom’s sweet voice singing. I frantically search for her, worried that some harm has come to her. I pass a clearing and there she is bent over my very own motionless body. My mom is knelt over me, tears streaming down her face and yet her voice is calm and unfaltering and betrays the overwhelming look of desolation painted on her face. She has obviously just lost her youngest offspring, her daughter, her friend, and still her strength refuses to fail her. My father stands over her, his head bowed down, and yet still from where I stand I can see the anguish in his eyes, utter pain. My mouth moves and my head yells that I am ok, but no audible words escape my quivering lips. I am perplexed by disbelief. I look to see if I can recognize some faces in the crowd that stands around my parents. It’s my family and friends and I can feel my own heart shatter as I see and hear them weep for me as my mom leads them in song.


If I was to fall off the side of a cliff, and I am hanging on, will there be someone there to help me up? What will people say about me when I pass? What will people remember about me? Will people miss my presence? And will my memories last through several decades or will I be forgotten within a week? Have I loved selflessly? Am I loved undoubtedly?


I do not want to leave this here earth with regrets. I want to live every day of my life as though it were my last. So lately, I have been appreciating my friendships a little more, and, I think I am starting to realize that although REAL and TRUE friends are rare, I have people that support me. I have figured out the people we work so hard to impress are the ones that really aren’t worth impressing. True friends stay when the tough gets going and those that we usually work so hard to impress go when the tough times roll in. However, I am learning to look at both sides of every story. And I must sell the same product that I want to buy; hence this is my pledge to be a better friend. I’m going to love more aggressively, listen more passionately, and be a positive light in all my loved ones lives. I am going to nurture each relationship in my life so if the Lord takes either me or one of them unexpectedly, I won’t cry for words and feelings that went unshared. But rather rejoice for the time that was shared and appreciated. As always, I leave you with a quote, and this one is from Maria Robinson, she said “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”