Today is my Mother's birthday. She was born on August 31, 1922. That was 90 years ago. She passed away in 2004. August has been an emotional month. It's also my Father's birthday and their wedding anniversary.
And tomorrow I celebrate my birthday. I've spent a lot of time thinking about my parents lately. Sometimes I think it would be fun to write down all the things I would converse with them if they were still around. Everyday, ordinary things.
To add to the emotions of the month I have a close friend who is watching her daughter lose her battle with cancer. A daughter who is close in age to my own daughter. The divine beauty of their mother daughter relationship as they go through this last shared mortal experience has been amazing to me. And I am grateful for the privilege of being a part of it.
How do you say good bye to a parent, and how do you say good bye to your child? How do you look at your grand children and explain to them that their mother isn't going to be there next month when they get home from school.
How do you capture today, these real moments in time? The shared experiences, the joy, the pain. How do you mentally record every single minute, each conversation, every smile? Somehow you just do.
In the 1970s a play was written called My Turn on Earth. I was in college and saw the stage play in Utah. The lyrics were so powerful many of them have stayed with me all these years.
One of the songs is titled Forever. The play and music was written by Lex De Azevedo and Carol Lynn Pearson.
Forever
Some dreams must wait,
Life isn't long enough
Some dreams must wait to come true
Sometimes it seems
Life just begins and then
All of a sudden it's through
There's songs you won't sing
There's stories that you won't ever hear
Pages you'll never turn
Words that you'll never know
Words that you'll never know
Things that you never will learn
Some dreams must wait
Life isn't long enough
Some dreams must wait to come true
It's nice to know there's all eternity
For everything you'd like to do
There aren't any clocks
There aren't any clocks
There aren't any things like calendars
No such thing as too late
Just always and evermore
That's why I think it's so great
That Heavenly Father and Mother
Figured it out so clever
There's never enough time
And that is why I'm
Glad that we go on forever
We go on forever.
I have some other friends that have family members battling cancer at this time. I sit on the sidelines, right now I'm merely an observer and I marvel at how people cope. I watch and I learn from them.
My heart, my love and my prayers goes out to them all. I truly do understand life and death, I don't question why, but I also feel the earthly pain of it.
And tomorrow, well tomorrow is my birthday. It's my day for celebrating my life. I will spend the day at a wedding with my husband and his family. And we shall have joy.
