Good Morning, TSJ Peeps!
At least I am starting this in the morning and may have to finish it later. But I am thinking about our TSJ community daily. This will be a bit longer because I am offering a personal update as well as our Soap Lesson (story).
Update on SJ and Solomon. If you remember, last week their hearts were bandaged.
Today, their bandages have been removed!!!
Solomon is free because the scripture verse he wore for practice is now deep within his heart. He knows its truth way down deep that indeed God, our Great Shepherd, is “close to the broken hearted.” In fact …. so close… you cannot imagine. What is closer to us than our hearts?
SJ (Solomon Jr.) also has shed his bandage because he wants to copy Solomon in everything…except being quiet and listening for the Shepherd’s whisper in his heart. So he still has the little red heart pinned on. He is busily trying to help me in his most authentic way. He says he is holding my heart and crying with me “like TSJ peeps do.”
I am doing well. Doing well in periods of transition (and loss is a huge transition) is difficult to describe. But it is a shared journey of human emotion. I am re-learning the truth that experience is a heart matter. It can be shaped by our thoughts (our brain knowledge and power of choice) but emotions themselves are not logical. Logic is wonderful, useful, and obviously necessary to live on Planet Earth as physical beings. But there is more.
Children often capture the essence of things best. (I can hear SJ saying, “I keep telling you that!”) And they listen to adult conversations (if those conversations are not lectures for them or reminders of their to-do lists). They listen for matters of the heart. I was reminded of this yesterday when I received a beautiful drawing by our nine year old grandaughter who not only has lost grandpa but is very in tune with our grief. While at school, she was inspired to draw me a picture. Her mommy sent it via text. It captured the absolute essence of what we not only feel but need to remember will heal us.
Last week I was touched by our young TSJ peeps who sent me cards, pictures, and poems as well as Scripture verses! This week I was blessed by the love of our twin grandkids who each in their own way shared love that truly expands my heart and mind. Love does that. It opens us to new possibilities and hope.
It is JUST soap! Or is it?
When I first returned from my sister’s home where I was totally cared for, I had to face the oceanic waves of grief. Gradually, I have learned the importance of those waves as they help us heal from those awful feelings that make us sick in spirit.
Like a stomach virus helps us shed the illness (unpleasant as it is) in order to heal, apparently our hearts do the same thing. I am seeing them now as “waves of healing” and that perspective came from the help I have received from a book one of our dear TSJ peeps sent to me called: A Time to Grieve by Carol Straudacher. It is a beautiful and gentle book about the experience of grief and appropriate for all. It is not a religious book so atheists and people of all faiths will benefit. I highly recommend it if you have lost a loved one.
The soap lesson started in the shower where I struggled with tears every morning because I kept looking at a dwindling bar of soap that was Tom’s. I use the body wash and he used the soap bar. I have never moved it even when he moved downstairs to the hospice bed.
It was here that I started seeing the difference between rational thought and emotional experience. Rationally, I kept saying to myself…it is just soap. A material thing. It is not Tom. It is just soap. But I did not remove it. I usually would have whisked it away to clean up the soap dish.
Then, I began to see it differently. Like waves of grief can now be seen as waves of healing. . . bringing on “necessary tears” as one of our TSJ peeps said, the soap IS more to me than just soap. For me in deep sadness, it was the scent of Tom and the silent witness to Tom’s existence and his morning routine. My reaction is a reflection of love. Material/physical things give witness to our human existence…our non physical presence in people’s hearts.
The soap truly is dwindling as you would expect. It is no longer a bar. It is a two inch reminder. And I am okay with it dwindling because the deep gut wrenching grief is also dwindling and I am clearly re-entering life and tasting moments of my own “new normal” existence.
Solomon is right. Things of the heart are what last forever.
I must go now and do some things of the mind, however. Like you, I must enjoy the pastures prepared for me today under the guidance of our Unseen but very Present Shepherd.
The brain says soap is just soap.
The heart says it is so much more.
Solomon says it is best to let the heart speak. Love expands our horizons.
Margie
This is truly touching! Although totally different I can appreciate this struggle. As I mourned the person I was before my aneurysm tore through life it was my Jeep that I was driving that I was unwilling to let go of! For some reason when I drove it I was still a familiar part of me! While most people would want to get rid of this reminder, I clung to it! The only thing that knew the “real story” of that day! It was part of who I was, part of a borrowed identity that I needed for a time. Enjoy and savor the smell of the soap while it is given to you! It is okay to leave it there for season and then when the season is over the Lord will give you memories, pictures, and unexpected blessing exactly when you need them BUT for now, smell the soap and we will continue to hold the ropes in prayer for you! ((Hugs)) -Lisa
Thank you, Lisa, for this insight and your encouraging words. I will hold them in my heart and allow the grief to teach me its many truths. You certainly have been and continue to be a courageous young woman who knows suffering and grace. Proud to be your aunt!