Reconciliation
So I was having a kind of self induced misery kind of day today. The weather outside is about as perfect as it comes - sunny, about 76 degrees, light wind blowing - and because I am the queen of procrastinating (despite the fact that I am doing so much apparently this is a lifelong habit I will have to battle because, you know, that Sheri chick learns almost everything the hard way. Over and over again), I got to spend my day indoors writing a paper that is due on Tuesday, the day after a major exam. So I wasn't happy about having procrastinated and I wasn't happy about writing a paper when I wanted to be outside tending my bushes and flowers and I wasn't happy that everything feels so hard right now. But I got the paper done and ignored my sloppy house and followed Joe's loving orders to get outside and do a little self treatment of my vitamin D deficiency in the hammock. THAT was restoration at its finest. Too bad I could not spend all day doing that.
After my shower, I came inside and noticed a reference to someone declining an invitation I too had recieved because her child is attending prom tonight. Uh oh. I began to go down that seductive pathway and before I knew it, I was on the high school website and there in front of me was not only the date of prom (not tonight), but the date of graduation (June 7th), the date that caps and gowns and announcements were delivered (March 25th) etc. And bang, that familiar pressure in my chest started up. And for whatever reason, the term "reconciliation" came into my head as I looked over pictures of Joseph, aching inside, trying so hard to imagine what he would look like now.
Reconciliation. A term from my childhood referring to a sacrament in the Catholic faith. I always thought of it as meaning "forgiveness" or "to make right again". But something in me took it to the dictionary to find the pure definition. Webster says it means "To restore to harmony". Harmony. What a holistic word that is. It implies resonance, logic, mathematical balance. As a musical person, it says to me there is a place for the disonant note, that there is meaning behind a major and minor pairing and that all things balance one another out to elicit emotion through rhythm and pitch.
In that light, I can find less distress in my tearful moments, my urges to examine and find the days that would be so meaningful if Joseph were still here. Lord, how I miss him. I am such a better person now than I was when he was alive. I wish I had been THIS version of me then, this kind of healthy, this kind of balanced. I would love to know him and parent him as Sheri2011 instead of Sheri version 1.0.
I read a story recently from a hospice nurse from the book I mentioned the other day. In it a dying gentleman who had lost a son and in the story he kept seeing the son sitting in a chair in the corner of the room, telling him "Come on Dad, it is time to go!" What an awesome thought that is.
After my shower, I came inside and noticed a reference to someone declining an invitation I too had recieved because her child is attending prom tonight. Uh oh. I began to go down that seductive pathway and before I knew it, I was on the high school website and there in front of me was not only the date of prom (not tonight), but the date of graduation (June 7th), the date that caps and gowns and announcements were delivered (March 25th) etc. And bang, that familiar pressure in my chest started up. And for whatever reason, the term "reconciliation" came into my head as I looked over pictures of Joseph, aching inside, trying so hard to imagine what he would look like now.
Reconciliation. A term from my childhood referring to a sacrament in the Catholic faith. I always thought of it as meaning "forgiveness" or "to make right again". But something in me took it to the dictionary to find the pure definition. Webster says it means "To restore to harmony". Harmony. What a holistic word that is. It implies resonance, logic, mathematical balance. As a musical person, it says to me there is a place for the disonant note, that there is meaning behind a major and minor pairing and that all things balance one another out to elicit emotion through rhythm and pitch.
In that light, I can find less distress in my tearful moments, my urges to examine and find the days that would be so meaningful if Joseph were still here. Lord, how I miss him. I am such a better person now than I was when he was alive. I wish I had been THIS version of me then, this kind of healthy, this kind of balanced. I would love to know him and parent him as Sheri2011 instead of Sheri version 1.0.
I read a story recently from a hospice nurse from the book I mentioned the other day. In it a dying gentleman who had lost a son and in the story he kept seeing the son sitting in a chair in the corner of the room, telling him "Come on Dad, it is time to go!" What an awesome thought that is.
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