what once was

I watched a bright orange sun rise this morning behind a frost-covered pear branch. The chill of the air worked its magic on my cheeks, as I spent a sleepless night moving back and forth across my pillow, thinking of a young boy...a child who went to school with my girls. He was nine, a cub scout and sang in a local choir. His life was lost on the playground a few days ago as I sat in my car talking to my husband about a casserole that I would make for dinner. I squinted off in the distance at the gathering of faculty and student and said a prayer as the EMT's trotted toward a fix that I thought would be a broken leg, a bad cut..a scrape or two. As I slowly moved forward, the cacophony of laughter, the squeak of swings, the excitement of a day well-studied seeped through my window along with the soft snore of my pup in the backseat. It was there, I picked up my babies, like any other day...watching their familiar jog to the car, smiles wide, arms full of backpacks and colored-paper drawings of princesses and rainbows. As we drove away, little did I know our hearts would stay behind and the hallways would forever be palpable with the sadness of one missing.

The last few days have been heavy and thick. I have looked into the worn faces of our brave school staff whose eyes will not shine for quite sometime now and watched the rosy cheeks of the very young ones atop the monkey bars, pristine in the purity of their faith, unknowing in their innocence of the harsh blow that life has given us. A wallop when we least expect it...a change that takes away warm, summer days, popsicle grins and a Christmas that never feels quite the same way again. But it is within these agonizing fractures, we learn to listen and love..to smell a rose we hurry past each morning, to see that any typical day is really not that at all. And if the 48 years I've spent on this planet has taught me anything- it is that poison can be turned into medicine. This boy's life will shout from the highest mountain tops as the many who have left before him. And we, the caretakers, will learn a little bit more at how better to keep them safe.

Today at 2 o'clock, they will memorialize this precious child. They will speak of his angelic voice, his love for video games and the imaginings & adventures he shared with his big bro. I will spend the day like I have the last few, thinking of a woman I never met but who I feel I know deeply. A mommy no different from myself and all the mothers who read this...whose breath and meaning are for their babies. I will pray for footsteps forward, for hopeful mornings...for joy again within this family.

I wish you well in your travels, Jonathan. May your rebirth be swift and glorious. There is a star that is you which will shine in a night sky this evening and in the hearts of all who knew you, sweet boy.

www.haydensgoal.org/