Easter Vigil: Remembrance

I posted the following as a comment in the recent DailyKos diary You Are Not Alone by noweasels, but thought it was thoughtful enough to also post as a separate piece -- please also read the piece by noweasels, and thank her for the inspiration. The rest of what follows below the fold is essentially the entire comment -- two personal submissions for remembrance today that I submitted, plus a parting thought. ...if you're still with me, then jump... I thought I'd add these, too. One is older, one

is recent, but both personal. First, my remembrance of "T.J." -- the Mayor of Little Shoes Lane -- who would be seven years old as of last February, and who died five years ago just two days before his second birthday.

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"TJ" was born on February 22, 2001. He died on the 20th of February, 2003. He was the eldest child of a small family, and big brother to his infant sister Liz. They all lived on a street we'll call Little Shoes Lane, in a small town in New England. At the funeral mass for TJ, his father spoke briefly about his son. He wanted the people who had never met TJ to get an idea of what he was like, and why he would be so sorely missed. This text was inspired by those words, and is dedicated to the memory of TJ, penned by a sad uncle in February 2003.
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Today, Wifey and I will be spending time with some of our other nieces and nephews, but our thoughts will also (and always) include T.J. and the warmth he brought to our entire family. The second, which I'm sure most folks have already guessed, is my request for remembrance of Mumsie, who passed away shortly before Christmas just this past December. This will be our first Easter without her, and I know that it will be hard on Wifey; this is our "year of firsts" in that regard, and they often suck for their notable absence of a loved one even though we do find ourselves warmed by the memories and the continuing presence of the departed within our hearts and souls. Here are the various pieces I've written which have featured or heavily included references to Mumsie:

1	Stir of Echoes: Haunted Hearts and Healing Melodies	03/11/2008
2	Synchronicity	09/01/2007
3	Yia-Yia and Woo-Woo -- BFF [Warning: Pictures]	06/03/2007
4	Mumsie entered a nursing home today.	05/22/2007
5	Subjective Objectivity: On Death (and Recovery)	02/02/2007
6	The lady vanishes...again.	06/03/2006

The top reference -- Stir of Echoes: Haunted Hearts and Healing Melodies -- was shortened, explanatory version of what I'd published over on ePluribus Media; the candidate diary wars were in full swing, and I wasn't in a frame of mind where I thought it was worth repeating or fully crossposting. The two ePluribus Media pieces that are referred to are these:

1. Stir of Echoes
2. Musical Deconstruction of a Life's Worth of Memories

They are longer, but much more detailed and better for getting to know Mumsie. Wifey thought the songs and memories they evoked were very appropriate, so there's that... I leave you with a final remembrance -- one to take with you as you reminisce and as you move along through your Sunday, be it a holiday or not:

I read of a man who stood to speak
At the funeral of a friend
He referred to the dates on her tombstone
From the beginning to the end

He noted that first came the date of her birth
And spoke the following date with tears,
But he said what mattered most of all
Was the dash between those years

Those lines constitute the beginning of the poem The Dash by Linda Ellis. You can read the poem or watch The Dash movie at the links above, or read a piece I wrote called The Dash, a Comma and a Footnote which includes the video of The Dash movie plus some other commentary (semi-political) -- regardless, the message of the Dash and importance of how we spend our dash should not be lost upon us. Namaste, and have a wonderful day. Happy Easter, everybody.