Monday, January 23, 2012

Love in the dark

It was late, about 11 p.m.  A handful of us had walked down to the beach to end our evening of tribute to my son by floating white roses on the ocean. It was foggy and raining pretty hard. It didn’t matter. We were all feeling the warmth of the earlier gathering with close friends.  We had had a potluck dinner, watched a movie that the boys had made in their early teens, and raised a glass to Dunc.  We laughed and cried and thanked Duncan for being such an inspiration to us all.

We stood at the water’s edge.  It was low tide and I was thinking the roses would likely float right back to us on shore after we had set them adrift.  Everyone had their own space and time to say goodnight to him, and one by one, we cast our roses into the sea.  We watched in awe as they all began to glow.  It was the only thing we could see as everything around us was so dark.  Someone began to sing Amazing Grace softly.  Another had tears – and perhaps they were his first tears, I don’t know, but there was a lot of healing happening in that moment for all of us.

The roses continued to glow – a surreal sight and also a very real message that no matter how dark one’s hours can get, love won’t be extinguished. 

The roses did not come into shore.  Against the pull of the tide, those little beacons headed straight for Christie Islet, a place where we had scattered his ashes four years earlier.

We all realized we had witnessed a moment of truth.  Love is visible, love lights our way, and love leads us home.

Thank you Duncan.

Truly in awe,

Buns (a.k.a. Mom)

2 comments:

  1. Beautiful Christie. I love how you celebrate Duncan's life. Rachel died two years ago today so your words are more poignant. For me, I spread some of her ashes in every beautiful place I think she'd like to have seen. Blessed to be her mum, then and now. Becky xxx

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  2. beautiful, Christie, I can only imagine the anguish of losing a child. I admire your strength, for it is a great strength, I'm sure, that has allowed you to survive this and to breathe every day since.

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