My blogging about the grief and healing from Emily’s death has been surprisingly upbeat. Sometimes I berate myself for that. Should there be more gnashing of teeth and despair? Certainly that has been present, though my current state of mind is more of an ice age rolled-over terrain, which has gently rolling hills and valleys, not like the Coast Mountain Range that I can see across the Salish Sea: craggy, unpredictable and insurmountable. Earlier on, that’s what this grief felt like, but now it is gentler, though ever-present in various forms.

I keep saying that very often my grief sits alongside happiness. They are companions. I am never without grief, though I am very often at peace, and quite often, happy. Sometimes, I am even elated. The fact that emotions can co-exist still surprises me: that I can wake up happy to start my day inspecting the vegetables while I chat with Emily and asking for serendipity for the day. She must have been chuckling this morning as I hastened out the French doors, seeing two very fat bunnies IN MY BACK YARD that had just been fenced in to prevent such a travesty from occuring (and to keep Moondog contained). I turned on the hose and started chasing these two plumpies wildly around the yard until they cowered under my driftwood cottage that has recently been erected. I aimed and sprayed with such force that they were compelled to come out and prance wildly around the yard, dodging and hoppity-hopping to their escape route (which turns out to be a little-too-much of a gap in the bottom of the new fence), while I yelled, “Not on my time, you blankety-blank blanks!” 

After such incident I joked with Emily, “Thanks for waking me up, kiddo.” I didn’t even have time to slip on my flip flops. My pajamas were drenched with water and my dirty-feet tracks are evidenced all around my newly-cleaned house. I seem to give Emily credit for everything these days, because I invite her presence in all that I do. Now, at least, I know what needs to be remedied, so I can give thanks for that. A different kind of serendipity, but my new language is gratitude so I will give thanks even for this.

In this earthly part of the eternal cycle, there is just always more to do. I’m thinking heaven (or whatever we want to call it) has the same-type of busy-ness, but the doing is always joyful and can often involve the protection and presence of one’s loved ones who are still firmly planted here on the planet. Emily always loved to keep busy, and I am sure she is creating and building and playing jokes and finding out in the deepest and most wonderful ways possible all the things she always wondered about. So curious…she now has all the answers. I’m so glad for her. 

Yesterday, though, I was sad for me. Looking for a car title we need to import our car to Canada, I came across more notes from Emily: Mother’s Day cards, notes to the tooth fairy along with her baby teeth – the fairies were building houses in Card Language Land with her teeth – her beautifully created world that was a huge part of her childhood and continued into her teens. Emily was delighted by this. I also found some of my homework from Ms. Emily, as she called herself as my card language instructor, along with various receipts that she had scribbled on in card language and embellished with her signature. I laughed and felt joy, but I also felt sucker-punched. I had to sit on the back steps and sob, then eat a large number of cookies that Don had foolishly picked up from Costco for the visiting Charlotte, and then crawl under the covers for a few afternoon hours on a warm June day.

I compelled myself to get up and do some banking, buy some new basil – my greatest plant failure to date – and get a library card. These tasks calmed me, as I listened to CBC radio and all the false hope that the Edmonton Oilers would bring the Stanley Cup back to Canada. They must be hurting this morning, those poor Oilers. Not a hockey fan particularly, I had still hoped for a win. 

But what is life if not partly disappointment combined with pleasure and satisfaction and some joy? How can we deeply experience one end of the spectrum in its fulness without having some of the other? A rainbow has two sides with beauty filling in the entirety of it.

So, today I will be cognizant of my multitude of emotions, attempting to observe and accept them all. I will be mindful as I prepare for a dear friend’s two or three day visit; I will be kind to my sweetheart, Don, who does so much to make my life so beautiful in endless acts of service (his love language), while annoying me with the beard trimmings in the sink and his breakfast preparations never put away; I will embrace Charlotte who visits so often at such inconvenience to herself yet such desire to be with us in our humble home here on Vancouver Island, even when she wants to spend so much of her time in her bed and ours; I will be content in the imperfection of my earthly life, knowing that it is infinitely more perfect than most people’s because I choose to accept it all, even the loss of my Emily’s physical presence. And I will always say it that way. Death, I believe, is on an infinite continuum – there is no beginning and no end. So we are together – in the dips, in the rainbows, on the peaks: we are always together.