9 candles

I meet every other week with a group of people that share our path. When we first met, we were strangers and now I am certain we are friends. The very first night I met them I felt that I had known them all of my life or met them somewhere else but I couldn't put my finger on where. I thought that maybe I ran into them at the grocery store, maybe I went to high school with them, maybe it was in passing at the Dr's office but after getting to know them a little better I know I had never met these people prior to our first interaction yet their faces are ones that I swear to you are ones that I have known as if they were always in my life. Maybe I was always supposed to meet them. Maybe our paths were always supposed to cross. Maybe it is because we share a connection of a shattered heart on the mend...

If a stranger were to walk up upon our table at a distance and gaze at our world from the outside, he would see a group of young people, some by themselves, some with their significant others, all laughing, smiling and enjoying dinner and each others company. If the stranger pulled up a chair and sat with our table he would still see laughter and smiling but he would also see the heartbreak, the longing and the tears. Some days we have struggles and some days are difficult...hell sometimes even the hours are difficult. Sometimes all we can do is breath in and breath out and be glad we survived the hour and that it has passed. Some days we can't catch our breath or a break. Some days we laugh all day. Some days we smile all day. Some days we hope to hope.

I say this to the stranger, please pull up a chair and get to know us before you assume. We are a group of young people who laugh, who smile, who cry, who get angry, who know true pain. We do not choose to be sad. We do not choose to be angry. We do not choose to cry. We are just mothers and fathers with a child in the sky. Please do not judge us. Please do not belittle our pain. Please respect that we may cry forever. Please listen to our words. Please know that even if you give up on us, we will not give up on each other.

This evening, after D and I left our dinner with our friends I went to the chapel. Instead of lighting my 1 candle for my little family, I lit 9 candles. I lit a candle for Aven but I also lit a candle for Valentina and Bee's mother and father, for Silas and Skylar's mother and father, for Conley and Hadley's mother and father, for Isaac's mother and father, for Madeline's mother and father, for Lorenzo's mother and father, for the mothers and fathers we didn't get a chance to see tonight and lastly I lit a candle for all of the mothers and fathers that are in the hospital at this very moment beginning this very journey.

I found this poem while searching for something entirely different. It really wasn't what I had intended wrapping my post up with but after reading it I had to share it. Every time I see doves, cardinals, wild flowers, something in nature that is inspiring...I always think of my sweet Aven. This Irish blessing is beautiful and I am going to hang on to it so that I can read it on days when my heart and my spirit need a lift.

An Irish Blessing

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there... I do not sleep.
I am the thousand winds that blow...
I am the diamond glints on snow...
I am the sunlight on ripened grain...
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you waken in the morning's hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of gentle birds in circling flight...
I am the soft star that shines at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry—
I am not there... I did not die...