Cemetery Sentiment

The monument went up this week.

We quite like it.  Once the landscapers in my life have spruced up the grounds surrounding it, we'll re-post another portrait of mom's resting place.

To clarify, our sister's tombstone is flat and was right beside mom's 'plot' (that word just sounds strange in my ears) and it was moved to become the new foot-stone of a double side by side burial plot  * spot/place/grave?!    A headstone wide enough to straddle both spaces :) and engraved with Moms chosen scripture verse, turned out to be a convenient and meaningful way to respect our mothers' desire for a more 'family' oriented resting place.

I'd like to take this opportunity to publicly thank and recommend the services and staff of Kitching Steepe and Ludwig Funeral Home.   Respectful, compassionate, professional, amazing....these are the words that come so easily to mind in describing our experience with them.

Supply of monuments is a new and welcome complement to their many fine ways 

of assisting families with their final arrangements.

Union Cemetery in Waterdown is old, well-treed and now, almost at capacity.  

When our kids were young we would often end our family picnics at the Dundas Driving Park with a walk through the old cemetery up on the hill.  Many a pioneer cemetery in Ontario 

(and almost ALL the ones on the Cabot Trail in Nova Scotia) have been traversed in quiet contemplation by myself and camera and usually accompanied by someone(s) I love.

Laying the body of my very young sister in the ground (and her still born child before that) was an experience of the soul-shaping sort; one that sparked a yearning 

to be found standing in a cemetery on The Day ~ that final day of this world as we know it.  

On that day, at the sound of God's command and a trumpet call like something 

OUT OF THIS WORLD, 

(uhm...Duh! :) 

I will see Jesus coming down from heaven and THEN...

all the dead in Christ will rise first!

And then, after that?   Those of us who are still alive 

and are left will be caught up together with the throng of rising dead in the clouds 

to meet the Lord in the air!

.... and so we will be with the Lord forever.
I Thessalonians 4: 13ff

Yep.  The Bible tells me so.  And I believe it.

A cemetery will be a front row seat to the unspeakably spectacular.  

The camera won't matter so much.
Being there with someone(s) I love, will.

Processing Pain - the lighter side

A True Story...

Three year-old grand-daughter Danielle, 

one of five precious ones 

so precocious...

... so wild in a wonderful kind of way.

She was processing the events of Christmas Day where she roamed among 75 relatives, each coping with the somber reality of having to say a final goodbye to (super) grandma; 

the atmosphere heavy with tears and laughter in constant collision...

She found me at the kitchen table at the end of a day filled with fine food & finer fellowship.  

I hoisted her up to fasten the last few buttons on her coat.  

Out of the blue, she pulled my face close to hers (eyelashes almost touching) and exclaimed 

"Grandma?  We are ALL going to die!"

And then, without skipping a beat, she said -

.... Can I have some chocolate?

*sigh* 

She does an aching heart so much good.

River Crossed!

Mom, surrounded by her children....

Newly arrived in the celestial city. 

Safe in the arms of Jesus. 

I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.

They will come in and go out, and find pasture.  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy;

I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

John 10: 9-10

But now, this is what the LORD says -- he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
"Fear not, for I have redeemed you; 
I have summoned you by name;
you are mine.
When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you...."
Isaiah 43

To all who have loved this woman along with us -
our sincere gratitude 

for your faithful friendship and loving care.  

God is very very good.  

(p.s. He was so gentle too!)