A Marathon of Memories
Oct. 8th, 2012 10:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogNot quite 24 hours ago, I got back in our door from a day-and-a-half full of memories of a race well run and a life not quite fully lived.
There's a whole album of photos from this trip here, but I'll share a few of them in the text below. Since this summer, I'd planned to take time over this weekend to see my younger niece (and a couple of other friends) running a half-marathon on Long Island. It was one friend's birthday, which was sweet and touching, but the bigger impetus for the drive was that the event was on the 24th anniversary of my sister Sandy's death, and her daughter Nicole was dedicating the run to her honor and memory.
Saturday dawned chilly but clear, and I got on the road by 11 and was at my old home town's most famed pizza place by 7 (even with an almost-hour stop at my other sister's place at the halfway point). I caught up with Nicole and her race partner there-
- before they, and I, headed several miles further east to our hotel and I, at least, had a fitful night of sleep before needing to get to the start of the course on Sunday morning.
Nothing like Republican politicians to glom onto a Big Event.
By the time the half-marathon started, I was hoping to see any or all of the four runners go past me once the few competitive racers and The Pack went by. I took random shots of the runners but was sure that I'd missed them all.
I was wrong:
That's Cristina to the left of the lady in black, and Nicole to her left. She didn't see me on the sidelines, and I just as obviously missed her until she commented on the photo a few minutes ago. Serendipity is an odd thing sometimes.
----
They-all then had miles to go, so I headed back to my car and back into my old home town for various errands. First was church- at the place I spent the first 17 years of my faith journey. There are few still there who remember me, even fewer who ever knew my sister, but I felt a sense of place and of need, and asked the minister (an awesomely cool individual who I Friended on Facebook after the last time I visited) if I could use the lectern to share a "joy and concern" about the day- mainly so the older folks could hear what I was saying.
This, in rough, is what I said:
I've come here today and asked to share this with you because it was 24 years ago today that we mourned the passing of my sister Sandy. I share it here, because she was confirmed into membership in this congregation; she was married in this sanctuary; and she baptized her oldest daughter in (I motioned to the front of the opening-out slot in the lectern) this font.
I was just a kid then, so I remember very little of any of that, but I do remember 1988 very well. By then, she had been taken by demons- not of hell, but of this world and of her mind- who took, first her spirit, then her body, and finally her life. She left a husband and daughters who were devestated, two siblings who were saddened and a little angered, and a mother - my mother, who most of the older members of that church knew- who would never be the same again after losing her little girl.
We mourned her loss this day that year, but it's taken years to realize how much we didn't lose. Not a day goes by that we are not touched by her memory, and that she doesn't live on in our words, our thoughts, our actions. Both of those children, and both of those siblings, went on to marry (my own predating her death by not quite a year). Her children and I have gone on to have children of our own, and her own grandchildren know of "Grandma Sandy" with almost as much fondness, and just as much love, as if she'd still been with us today.
So I thank everyone here for helping me center my sense of who she was, and why this place mattered to her, and her to us.
The service went on from there, as did the coffee hour, which I shared with a few I knew and a few I didn't. At least one of the latter knew what I meant by the "demons" (originating from bottles of alcohol) and thanked me for sharing that sentiment.
----
By then, things in the park were finishing, and I texted Nicole and another friend to see how close they were to the end. The other two were just competing their runs:
Sharon and Taryn, respectively. Nicole and her partner also finished, but Cristina had a worse run of it and was being checked out on an ambulance while the rest of us were making plans for Sharon's birthday lunch at a nearby hotel.
I headed over for it, enjoying conversation and memories with them and other friends, but in time Nicole messaged that her friend was okay and ready to head out to the cemetery. I excused myself and caught up with them at the gravesite:
Nicole, preparing her mother's stone for the tangible pieces of the day's event.
And the other two of the day: the flowers I brought, and a duplicate of her own half-marathon medal, which the organizers let her have once they heard where we were going and why she was running this day.
----
We said our teary goodbyes, and less than eight hours later, I was back home and nearing sleep. But I will always remember the
day, both from 24 years ago and just over 24 hours ago, as one which shaped the compassion and dedication that will always be part of my own life:)
There's a whole album of photos from this trip here, but I'll share a few of them in the text below. Since this summer, I'd planned to take time over this weekend to see my younger niece (and a couple of other friends) running a half-marathon on Long Island. It was one friend's birthday, which was sweet and touching, but the bigger impetus for the drive was that the event was on the 24th anniversary of my sister Sandy's death, and her daughter Nicole was dedicating the run to her honor and memory.
Saturday dawned chilly but clear, and I got on the road by 11 and was at my old home town's most famed pizza place by 7 (even with an almost-hour stop at my other sister's place at the halfway point). I caught up with Nicole and her race partner there-
- before they, and I, headed several miles further east to our hotel and I, at least, had a fitful night of sleep before needing to get to the start of the course on Sunday morning.
Nothing like Republican politicians to glom onto a Big Event.
By the time the half-marathon started, I was hoping to see any or all of the four runners go past me once the few competitive racers and The Pack went by. I took random shots of the runners but was sure that I'd missed them all.
I was wrong:
That's Cristina to the left of the lady in black, and Nicole to her left. She didn't see me on the sidelines, and I just as obviously missed her until she commented on the photo a few minutes ago. Serendipity is an odd thing sometimes.
----
They-all then had miles to go, so I headed back to my car and back into my old home town for various errands. First was church- at the place I spent the first 17 years of my faith journey. There are few still there who remember me, even fewer who ever knew my sister, but I felt a sense of place and of need, and asked the minister (an awesomely cool individual who I Friended on Facebook after the last time I visited) if I could use the lectern to share a "joy and concern" about the day- mainly so the older folks could hear what I was saying.
This, in rough, is what I said:
I've come here today and asked to share this with you because it was 24 years ago today that we mourned the passing of my sister Sandy. I share it here, because she was confirmed into membership in this congregation; she was married in this sanctuary; and she baptized her oldest daughter in (I motioned to the front of the opening-out slot in the lectern) this font.
I was just a kid then, so I remember very little of any of that, but I do remember 1988 very well. By then, she had been taken by demons- not of hell, but of this world and of her mind- who took, first her spirit, then her body, and finally her life. She left a husband and daughters who were devestated, two siblings who were saddened and a little angered, and a mother - my mother, who most of the older members of that church knew- who would never be the same again after losing her little girl.
We mourned her loss this day that year, but it's taken years to realize how much we didn't lose. Not a day goes by that we are not touched by her memory, and that she doesn't live on in our words, our thoughts, our actions. Both of those children, and both of those siblings, went on to marry (my own predating her death by not quite a year). Her children and I have gone on to have children of our own, and her own grandchildren know of "Grandma Sandy" with almost as much fondness, and just as much love, as if she'd still been with us today.
So I thank everyone here for helping me center my sense of who she was, and why this place mattered to her, and her to us.
The service went on from there, as did the coffee hour, which I shared with a few I knew and a few I didn't. At least one of the latter knew what I meant by the "demons" (originating from bottles of alcohol) and thanked me for sharing that sentiment.
----
By then, things in the park were finishing, and I texted Nicole and another friend to see how close they were to the end. The other two were just competing their runs:
Sharon and Taryn, respectively. Nicole and her partner also finished, but Cristina had a worse run of it and was being checked out on an ambulance while the rest of us were making plans for Sharon's birthday lunch at a nearby hotel.
I headed over for it, enjoying conversation and memories with them and other friends, but in time Nicole messaged that her friend was okay and ready to head out to the cemetery. I excused myself and caught up with them at the gravesite:
Nicole, preparing her mother's stone for the tangible pieces of the day's event.
And the other two of the day: the flowers I brought, and a duplicate of her own half-marathon medal, which the organizers let her have once they heard where we were going and why she was running this day.
----
We said our teary goodbyes, and less than eight hours later, I was back home and nearing sleep. But I will always remember the
day, both from 24 years ago and just over 24 hours ago, as one which shaped the compassion and dedication that will always be part of my own life:)
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no subject
Date: 2012-10-09 05:56 pm (UTC)