Oddly enough after a fantastic weekend with DeeDee and my special little munchkins and a couple of visits with my mother and then capping the weekend off with attending a Donor Remembrance ceremony in Baltimore yesterday, I am feeling extraordinarily fragile! Just a brief explanation of the Donor Remembrance ceremony - my husband, Jim, had a liver transplant in May of '96. We were honored just a couple of years later to meet his donor's husband and have maintained a loving relationship with him to this day. Anyway, Angelo (the donor's husband) has attended the "ceremony" religiously for the last 15 years. After Jim's transplant, Jim became a devoted advocate of organ donation and eventually became the Community Liaison for the Transplant Resource Center of Maryland and spoke publically for a number of years on behalf of organ donor programs throughout the world. Angelo and I attended this year together.... It is a very emotional and spiritual event. It honors all the families (and the donors themselves) who donated their loved ones much needed organs. I think one reason that I feel fragile after this event is that my Joe was an organ donor and believed wholeheartedly in organ donation, the gift of life. Unfortunately, none of the four people who died in the crash could be organ donors. It's a very complicated process and often misunderstood - another story for another time. Anyway......... Joe and Kim (Laura's mom) were divorced when Laura was not quite 2 years old. Kim remarried a wonderful fellow, Chris, and he and Joe became steadfast friends. Joe was enormously comfortable with Chris being Laura's step dad and the new families (Joe & Janet & kids) often did things together beginning with Joe and Janet's courtship! Pretty cool, huh? Okay - going to fix another JD and seltzer and then I'm going to share "Laura's Prayer" that Jim read at Joe's funeral. Jim delivered the eulogy! Joseph played "The Cathedral". I just sat in a trance.........
Laura's Prayer
Dear God, thank you for letting me and Bayli and Jessica be in the world right now.
I know that daddy would have wanted it to be this way for me and Bayli to be okay.
I have one little question to ask: If you can, tell my daddy that me and Bayli love him with all our hearts, and me and Bayli will be there beside him someday and he won't have to worry about us being apart.
Thank you, God, for everything you have done in the last few days for me and everybody else.
Daddy, you don't have to worry about not being there for me 'cause I still have one daddy and I love him like I love you. He may not be my real daddy but he feels like it.
Amen
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Ann's poem
Shards of broken glass lay upon the damaged pavement. Blood stains lay upon the fractured souls. A dream shattered. A lifetime of hope gone. What lies ahead is unknown. Lives are changed. Hope for the future is demolished. Survival is paramount. And, thus, begins the journey. The journey into the unknown. The journey into the deep abyss. The journey that slowly, methodically sucks the life out of your soul. The journey that must be travelled to begin the ascent back to normalcy again.! Year after painful year......
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