God Bless

I went to a particularly sad funeral this past weekend. My brother's wife lost her youngest sister to suicide. Her name was Rose and she was forty-nine years old with a husband, two daughters, ages fifteen and sixteen, and a step son whose age I'm unsure of but appeared to be early twenties, if even. I don't know if she had ever been given a clinical diagnosis but I knew, through my sister-in-law, that she had struggled for many years with depression.

The service was beautiful. It was held right at the cemetary and it was a lovely day. Things were suppose to begin at 1:00 but didn't get underway until more like 1:30 because the people just kept coming...and coming. As you walked toward the people who had begun to form a circle around her casket, you were given a single, fragrant rose. When we got closer to the casket and found our place in the circle, we could see the beautiful roses engraved in it's pewter looking sides. A fitting tribute.

As the two guitars and bongo drums began to play softly and two young teenage girls stepped up to the microphone and began to sing a rendition of Carole King's song So Far Away, I began to feel the heaviness of the occasion. There we were, all six hundred and fifty of us, under sunny skies with a hint of a cool breeze blowing the pedals of our roses, to pay final tribute to a woman who was never able to feel her own worth.

I noticed as the singing began that a big, fat hawk had landed on a tree branch across the way. I asked my husband to confirm that the tears in my eyes were not clouding my vision. "Nope! That is a HUGE hawk.". There he sat with his watchful eye, until the last chord was strum and the last word was spoken. I wanted to tell the girls that the messenger had come. I wanted them to know to be on the lookout for the messages that would surely be coming from their mom, but I didn't feel that I knew them well enough to know how my words would be received, so I stayed silent.

I've been, as we all have, to some very sad memorial services. There was my husband's best friend when we were younger, then his best friend's brother a few years later. A friend with AIDS, my husband's seventeen year old cousin. One of my best friend's eight year old son, friend's of ours eight month old baby and of course you all know how hard my mom's passing was for me.

I worked with a wonderfully sweet girl some years ago who was about to be married. People had started arriving from out of town for the joyous occasion and the celebrations had begun. The wedding was to be on Saturday and Thursday morning we got a phone call from her mom saying she'd been in a terrible accident on her way home from work the night before. By days end on Thursday, she was gone. The friends and family that were here to celebrate her wedding were now attending her funeral. I remember seeing her fiance's face at the gathering after the funeral, a look I've yet to forget. That was a hard one for sure.

All of these services were extremely heart breaking in their own ways but there's something about knowing that Rose had died at her own hand, that she felt her life had no value and that the love and friendship of these six hundred and fifty people could not penetrate the black hole that was her reality, that left me feeling a unique sadness. A unique sadness and a powerful gratitude that no matter how low I've been in my life, I have never known the desire to end it. At one point during her daughter's eulogy as she recounted some of the fun, happy memories she has of her mom, she said, "My mother always loved us more than she ever loved herself" and those words make Rose's service stand out among the rest.

As we stood and listened as James Taylor's You've got a Friend was sung, I couldn't help but hope that the legacy she had left behind for her girls was worth it. I raised my head and stared at the many faces who had come to say goodbye and couldn't help but hope that Rose could see how many people's lives she had touched with the beauty she could never sense in herself. I hoped that her darkness had transcended into the light and I prayed that she was at peace.

I pray that you're at peace Rose. God Bless.

xo,
Carrie