Tag: kindness

Faithful Relationships

On By SandraIn gratitudeLeave a comment

March 22nd was the 8 month anniversary of the death of my sweet husband. It has been so long and yet not even a year.  In reflection, I thought about those folks that made the day of his Life Celebration so special.  Immediately it brought to mind those that had prepared a dinner for all of the family.

Sunday, July 30 was special at our church for another reason.  It was the ending ceremony for the program of Koinania, our community resource program that is so active and so responsive to the needs of our community children.  It is a marvelous program that gives a creative and continuous learning opportunity to our community’s children during the summer months.

On this Sunday the children and the parents and community leaders come together to celebrate the experiences of the children and the exciting discoveries of the program. After the formal presentation there is a luncheon for all involved.

At the same time of this very large luncheon, the church also provided a meal for our large family before the memorial service.  Now you have to understand that this church is very small.  We, in the 50s and 60s, had thousands of members but today we have 50 or 60 people in our congregation that are active and we have many members that reside in nursing homes  So the few people of the church wear many hats to cover all of the jobs.

But on this Sunday, this small group of people pulled off an amazing feat.  They fed many people from the summer program.  But they also in another separate space fed a large family.  The food was abundant and the service was excellent. My family was well cared for as we prepared for a memorial service to honor our wonderful husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, uncle, brother-in-law and friend.

I know you can be a Christian without being an active member of a church. God only asks that you accept Him as your Savior.  But not to be involved with other Christians is a real loss.  The cameradery of persons that are like minded is amazing.  The exchanging of Christian views and of experiences is growth producing.  The coming together to praise and pray is without question a fulfillment of the spirit.

On this 8th month anniversary of my husband’s death I think of the many faces that I saw serving my family that meal.  I know the hard work that they put into serving two meals that day.  I know the tired feet and the sore shoulders of fixing all of the food for so many people.  I know the sacrifice of time, energy, money and effort that went into the preparation of this food.

It is with a grateful heart that I say “thank you ” to the many people that provided comfort for my children, my siblings, my grandchildren and great-grandchildren as we ate a delicious meal before the service. But more than that, I thank these folks for being my Christian friends.  God promised to care for me and He has sent so many wonderful Christian friends to fulfill that promise.

I challenge each of you to connect with others that are Christians.  When two or three are gathered together, God will be there to guide us to do what He wills. There is no greater calling.  We have a small church but we are a mighty force and I am proud to be a small contributor of this wonderful group of believers. Praise be to God.

Things I Miss

On By SandraIn death, grief, lossLeave a comment

It has been seven and a half months since my husband died.
I miss him so much.

I worry that as time passes I will forget the most endearing parts of our relationship.  I take notes on what I miss most.  I look at pictures each day. Surprising to me, I do not miss his image as much as I miss his actions.

I miss cuddling.
He was a great hugger.
He would spontaneously hold me.
At our age, and with his physical being, sex was not the great part of intimacy.  It was holding me.

I miss his presence next to me.
The way he would look at me and let me know that he was in love with me.
We fell in love the first time we saw each other and it never stopped

He was also good at verbalizing his love.  He would tell me each day that he loved me.

I have recently gone through a lot of paperwork to get rid of the stacks of things that need to be gone.  I found his cards that he had given me for birthdays and Valentines and Mothers’s day and anniversaries.  I read each one and the wonderful words he would add to the already lovely message of the card.  He was great at expressing love.

I really miss affirmation.
I have no one that tells me that I am doing a good job or I am an OK person.
I have no one that lets me know that I am a hard worker or that they appreciate me for all that I do.

Don’t get me wrong.  I have wonderful children.  I know that they love me.  But there is just something about having someone who tells you that they appreciate you…frequently. My husband did that for me. I knew he admired me for what I did and he let me know that my mind was sharp and my actions and hard work was in concert with him.  I felt good about myself.

I miss the little things he did that showed he cared.  He bought the gas.  I did not have to be concerned about a car on empty.  He took care of that.  He carried the garbage and the recycling to the center.  He wrote the checks and paid the bills.  He bought the groceries. The list could go on and on.

When I start looking at these things I begin to wonder what I did.  But we were good partners so I did the laundry, the cleaning and making the grocery list.

He loved to run errands.  I would make the list and he would run the errands.  He could spend all day running errands.  He love to interface with people when he ran the errands.  If I do the errands I make a list and try to do it with as much efficiency as I can. Not Ray; he enjoyed running errands and would dilly dally and backtrack and enjoy each person and each experience.  That is why he is missed by so many people.

To say that there is a void in my life is not doing it justice.  There is a huge hole.  As good as I feel I am doing without him, I cannot seem to fill this hole.

They say that time will heal.  I don’t want time to take away my memories or to replace missing him.  But there are some things that hurt so much I don’t think time could come close to repairing.