Days are Long, Years are Short

In terms of loss, grief and healing the days are long but the years are short. It’s hard to believe that Chris has been gone for 6 years and that last Saturday was my grandson’s first birthday! I can’t believe that it’s been a year since he arrived bringing joy beyond this world. He is my heart. He is just the cutest and sweetest little boy ever. (Said every grandparent everywhere!)

P was born on the same day as the memorial service for Chris was held just five years earlier.

Have you ever just felt God’s hand reach out and touch you? I have. All praise and glory to His name.

When we found out P’s due date of February 23rd, I took a deep breath. I thought, for just a second… How would we ever truly celebrate his birthday when that is the week of Chris’s death and our deepest mourning?

And, that thought passed and I was breathing again. This is His doing. What are the chances that this “just happened”? No, this was His plan laid out for us. He wanted to bring us up from the depths of our grief to celebrate life and what would be more perfect than the arrival of a child! It had been five years and we were to change the dread of the week to joy.

The same week P was due to arrive last year, we celebrated the marriage of one of my sweet nieces at beautiful Boone Hill Plantation. Celebrating Chris’s life with his death, the promise of new life with P’s arrival, and the promise of an everlasting love with M’s wedding. God’s hand.

Our focus on P’s arrival and M’s wedding last year didn’t keep us from remembering Chris. We do that every day. What it did provide for us was a break from thinking about that awful week of our life twenty-four hours a day for seven days. The week starts with those memories and at the end of it we find ourselves celebrating life and love.

So…..

I’ll carry you in my heart always, Chris!