My child as you start on your journey today, I bow my head faithfully and humbly pray That the Lord will walk with you and lighten your load. So your heart can keep focused on the end of the road. As you knock on each door, proclaiming God's word, May your faith never falter when discouragements heard. The message you carry, though not always welcome, IS true. It is the only true gift with any eternal value. The reward that is bestowed upon you and each believer, Is the incredulous glory of living again with our Redeemer. When you find a home where warm hearts abode, You'll find your steps quickened towards the end of the road. At the end of the road are treasures your eyes can't yet see. But your heart knows what is waiting ahead for thee. The castle you're building measures in more than silver and gold. Each brick made of love and memories forever to hold. So when ready ears are listening and eyes fall upon you. Do what it takes to let them know the gospel you share is true. Sing, pray, and honor Him until your bosom does burn. Your rewards will be great for each soul you return. When you meet members of the church, old and new, Who open their homes and hearts up to you. May they think of your family who sent you with care, Remembering you always each night in their prayers. At last my child, when your precious journey is through, You will find us at home, waiting here for you. We will be doing our own work to lighten the load. Adding bricks to our castle at the end of the road.
It funny how the mind protects people in their most fragile states, turning off pieces of memories for a time. Perhaps it is so our minds can simply rest from all of the 'what if's' allowing time to heal. We've talked about that as a family... it seems we've all stopped dreaming since Amanda's passing. Or at least, none of us can recall our dreams. But I think that is the Lords way of saying, "Be gentle and patient. She has work to do here. When she is ready AND when YOU are ready, she will come to you. Rest now. Be still and know that I am with her and I am here for you."
I had one night when I was starting to fall asleep when I could almost feel her cuddled in my arms and smell the sweetness of her clean wet hair. I breathed her in as if she was truly there. I could feel our breaths move together, one breath in for each breath out. I know it was just me, but in that state of near sleep, it felt so real to me and I just treasured that moment. It hurts sometimes because I want to see Amanda so desperately and I feel like all of my memories come from pictures around my house. I don't want to remember her through snapshots, I want to know and feel her in each moment.
I've missed dreaming. Sometimes her friends write about how Amanda came to them in a dream and it makes me smile because it's like she is going to the people who needed it the most. She is handling the most fragile first. I feel like she has never left us, at least in spirit, but still... I want her to come to me too.
Last night I slept without any dream recollection, then woke up for a bit and fell back asleep. In my second round of sleep early this morning, I got my wish. A dream with Amanda in it... at last :)
It started off a little strange and irritating. I remember there was an odor coming from the side of our house that smelled a little like dog pee. When I went to the side of the house, I found a doorway that led to a very long hallway that was connected to our house. Down that hallway were little pee puddles and near the end of that long hall was Spike, Amanda's chihuahua, lifting his leg on the wall, leaving a trail that led me straight to a room. When I opened the door to the room, Spike ran inside. Inside the room was a bed like Amanda's and a big white fluffy down comforter just like she had. I was looking around the room and then looked at the bed when I saw the comforter move. Amanda was under the covers. She looked out at me and smiled and said "Hi mama". I looked down at her and said "Hi sweetie. I've missed you. What are you doing in this room?" She climbed out from under the fluffy comforter and said, "I'm helping some other kids cross to the other side. See... here comes one now." Then a little child appeared and she went to the wall, which appeared very thin, like a white sheet, and she led the child through the wall saying "It's okay... go to Him." Then she climbed back under the comforter and pulled it up to her chin and said, "I love you mama." I said "I love you too baby", then I walked out of the room to find a Swiffer to clean up the pee puddles leaving Amanda to do her job.
Figures... I would finally have a dream with Amanda in it and all I can think about is cleaning up the pee puddles! I thought about that dream a lot today though and found great peace in it. It assured me that she is okay. She still loves and knows us and that she is doing her job to help others cross the veil to be with their Heavenly Father. It tells me that the veil is thin and she is still very close to us... as close as crossing over a hallway to another room. It also reminded me that Spike thinks he owns that little girl, but sometimes his possessiveness can come in handy. I know I won't be blessed with dreams every day, but I will learn to cherish each one I am given, just as I've learned to find the beauty in this loss of ours. It may be a while before I see Amanda again in the spirit world, until then, I will keep her in my dreams.
July 29th Rich and I went to church today at the Arcadia Foothill building so we could hear the daughters of our friends give farewell talks. One of the girls, Lauren, is going to BYU and her older sister, Cammie, is leaving to serve a mission in South Carolina. I used to tell Rich there was no way I could every be apart from one of our girls for 18 months while they served a mission. How could I go through my day without hearing their voice or being hugged by my girls? In fact, until we went to temple and were sealed to our daughters for time and all eternity, I would experience ocassional panic attacks. Knowing that we were sealed together forever took away those terrifying moments. Now my little girl is off serving a mission. Not in the Carolina's somewhere or in some foreign country where a second language is necessary to communicate, but she is serving a mission on the other side of the veil for her heavenly father. Having watched the reactions of friends and family to Amanda's passing and the Choose The Right message that was shared during her service being carried forward, I am certain that Amanda has impacted and changed many lives for the good. Still... I selfishly wish our separation was only to be for a short 18 months, and when she has finished her mission she will return to earthly home for us to raise her.
People keep asking me how I'm doing. My typical response to that question BEFORE Amanda's death would have been "good" or "great", but now all I can think of is "I'm hanging in". The truth is most of the time I do feel good because of the comfort the Lord and Amanda have been sending. Sometimes I actually feel guilty for not grieving more. I can hold it all together most of the time because I find myself taking each breath, each minute, each moment, each hour, each day, and each night as they come. I can manage if I keep living in the now. It's those desperate glances towards the future that throw me off... moments when the reality of not seeing my little girl until the next phase of our lives that sends my heart racing in panic and desperation. I ache so much from the loss of her physical being next to mine. Tonight as I made preparations for our Sunday night family dinner with our girls and their boyfriends, I felt that now familiar and unwanted panic creeping up on me, stealing away my strength. I kept thinking, "this dinner table should be set for 7 people(or 8 if Amanda's boyfriend also came), not six. We should be fighting over who has to sit in the oddball chair." There is an awkwardness about my life now. Hovering on the border of who I was before July 11th, who I am now, and who I am to become. As I sink in to this new life without one of my greatest lifes blessings, I find myself wondering where this new journey will take me. Will I make her proud of how I respond to this new way of living... without her?
Eventually, I know that people will move on with their lives. The condolence cards will stop coming. Her friends won't forget her, but they will have days when she isn't the first and last thing they think about. They will have nights when they dont feel the need to cry themselves to sleep. They will find joy and laughter in the simple beauty of life and live as though she were living through them. Will those days come for our family too? As much as I want to always remember her, I don't want it to always hurt to remember.
Amanda is serving a new mission now. One I know she didn't plan on serving for many, many years. Life is what it is though. There is no magic spell, wand, or fairy dust to change the outcome or our new circumstances. When people ask me how many daughters I have, I will always say "THREE!" with love and pride in my heart. Two that are with us, and one that is serving a mission for the Lord.
