Playing by the Rules?
I’ve heard friends and acquaintances express wonder and concern at how some individuals don’t “play be the rules” during these challenging times. Seeing some people in public wearing what I sarcastically call an “invisible mask” (failing to wear a mask at all), or wearing it around the neck, or below the nose is more than annoying, seems to me to be utterly disrespectful and displays downright indifference (and frankly, spits in the face of safety) regarding the many possible consequences.
Memorial Day
A day for remembering. A day for cherishing. A day for gratitude for the memories, the love, the laughter and the tears. God Bless not only all those here with us but also those gone, missed and still loved, honoring and holding them forever in our hearts.
Further Reading (Books on Transplant, Grief, etc.)
I’ve done a lot of reading to help understand the meaning of my experiences with Josh. Some, in fact many, are about reincarnation, some about healing after the loss, much about the spirituality experience that I have grown to accept and celebrate. These have been the most helpful and emotionally supportive while attempting to move forward in life and gain an understanding of why things happen as they do.
Ode to Josh
“The “Ode to Josh” blossomed into existence in March 1998. Apparently therapy of my own making, I have written poetry and letters to Josh and my favorite, the “Ode”, may be seen in a later chapter. One dark night I could hear rhyming verses in my head which literally woke me up out of a sound sleep. I felt compelled to go to the computer and get it down on “paper”. I feared that I would forget the words and consequently lose a priceless gift, one I now believe had sent to me by Spirit. Why else would this message come to me in my sleep? I had never written poetry before, but for the next months, my aching soul spilled out onto paper into a lengthy, cathartic poem. I worked on it for almost six months. The ode was the beginning of my return to any semblance of normality.”
-Taming Josh’s Dragon
Author: Debbie Sumner
How do YOU spell F-R-E-E-D-O-M?
It seems pretty silly to be excited about playing golf, but at this point, it is fantastic freedom. Last week my partner (in two different golf leagues) and I wanted to play a practice rounds (practicing both golf and Social Distancing). The weather, however, was very uncooperative, being in the low 40’s (and probably 5 degrees colder way up on the hill course) and accumulating some snow overnight. We opted out for both days. For me, cold can be only so much fun when golfing. My most comfortable cold is about 66 degrees. So much for last week’s foray into freedom!
Gratitude
Well, as we’re contemplating perhaps winding this isolation down (I have to admit that I’m just a touch hesitant about this), I’m thinking of the beginning of golf season and getting back outside in the – at long last – warmer weather. It reminds me of when Josh and I were learning to golf, back in the mid-nineties. We just whacked at the ball, trying to coax it forward, mere feet at a time. We had fun, laughed at each other a lot and cheered each other on when one of us had a good shot. In retrospect, it was wonderful just to have him outside being active and having fun.
Corona Wonderings, written on April 5, 2020
As I sit here at my keyboard this beautiful sunny morning, I see a normal Spring day outside my window. I wear earphones as I listen to “God’s Healing Frequencies” on YouTube. The neighborhood seems so green and beautiful, yet strangely barren to me. It makes me wonder what it was like for my mom and her family all those years ago, going through the Great Depression. Was their world a lonely, sad and angry place then? How did that change the population as a whole?
Surviving the Loss of a Child
The first thing I have to say is that a parent can have no expectations as to how much time your recovery will take. You’ll hear things all over the board. For me, two years seemed to generally be the beginning of my turn-around time, but everyone is going to be different. I certainly don’t want to sound callous. That was my perception of another bereaved mom’s statement when all this was fresh and excruciating in my life. At that time, I could not imagine that this unbearable ache would ever subside. Hearing her words, I squirmed uncomfortably in my seat as unbearable emotions began to bubble up. I had thought her comments were absolutely heartless, yet her statement that after two years, she was so much better, echoed for years in my head. At that time, only four months after his death, I was just not ready to receive that message.
Awaiting Transplant
The wait for transplant was a very difficult and emotional phase of our experience. It began in August of 1994 with one of our regular Pulmonary Clinic recheck appointments. This was when we learned that the transplant could wait no longer. Josh was running out of time and time was not on our side when it came to waiting for a donor. The wait for lungs, we were told, could be up to two years.
The Inspiration
I want to talk to you about the inspiration for my memoir, “Taming Josh’s Dragon.” Fearing judgment (well, perhaps fear is not an accurate adjective, but certainly, it was a real concern, or maybe just an expectation), I wasn’t sure whether I should include this part of my story, more fully explained in the Acknowledgement section. Yes, I went to a local medium seeking some peace and to hopefully dispel some of the intense pain and grief from losing an only child. For years, I worried about what people would think and say of me if they knew I was into that stuff?