Death has not won...

Recently I lost a college friend who was the 3 Cs, caring, charasmatic and constant.  I wrote the following poem at her funeral.  There is no dying, only living!  Even in her death, she lives.  We will miss her.

Death has not won.

There will come a day when the ease of losing her won’t be as difficult to take. 

There will come a moment when we will hold an image of her and our hands won’t shake,

but for now...I am here to say, Death has not won.

Today our hearts are heavy, our spirits are wounded and it feels like people are constantly slipping through our fingers.  And as the emptiness lingers and we remember Sonya,

I am here to say, that Death has not won.

There will be pain before there is complete peace and the feelings of what if and what now won’t cease and we will often ask God why, why her, why now and HOW could you let this happen, but in our anger we must remember that death has not had a victory here.  God’s complete love has wrapped around Sonya and she has transitioned into a place where death dare not celebrate.  I want to set the record straight, Death….you have not won.

Even in our suffering we rejoice in having have known her, having loved her, having worshipped or worked with her and eventually the phones will stop ringing, and it will sound like the birds have stopped singing and the tears won’t stop streaming, but remember that when Sonya left this place, that death did not, will not, won’t ever, win.

We Love You Sonya.

That Baby is all grown up...

I was 21 when I had my first child.  I didn’t like to admit I was young, single and a statistic back when she was a baby and I was ashamed for most of my 20s of what people thought about me.  I never wanted to be that girl, raising that baby, that way, so I walked with my head hung low very fast until life taught me a valuable lesson, walk proud and purposefully.  The only thing I was guilty of back then, was loving the wrong guy. Even though I was pregnant young and raising a baby on my own, I knew I had to continue my dreams so that she could have dynamic dreams of her own.  I raised her with the assistance of some really GREAT girlfriends that took turns watching her while I went to class and worked a full time job.  I couldn’t have done such a great job or completed my degrees without them, but I knew I didn’t want her to have the same difficult task as I did.

It dawned on me today that baby, my baby is 18 and in several months is headed to a University very soon.  For the majority of her life, I have prepared her for this phase of her life, but it frightens me immensely.  After all, it still feels like yesterday that someone let my hand go to let me walk on my own., even if sometimes the walk was brisk, cold and relentless.  I recognize she is about to walk out into the world, but I don’t feel like letting her hands go just yet.  I would rather hold her by her fingertips, so I still have a little grip in case she falls (or fails). What dawned on me is that some statistics are not all bad.  There are good statistics.  There are statistics that people shake their heads in disgust at in the beginning and by the end, they are applauding.  What I know for sure is that it takes a village to raise a child and as my baby leaves her village, I hope that she is among nobility. After all, I think I (with the assistance of the people in my village) did a great job so far.  I love you baby girl!  Make us proud.

Look how much she has grown….