Loss

Granny’s Farm

Posted on by Lauren

Today was a most difficult day for our family.

Today we said our final goodbye to Granny’s farm.

My in-laws home was so much more than just any-old-house.

Designed and built by my father-in-law, Bill, their retirement home rests upon over 50 acres of land on the banks of Lake Mattamuskeet, a National Wildlife Refuge found 30 miles from the nearest stop light. 

The land is full of migratory birds, black bears, and deer, to name a few. Rich, black soil supports vibrant family-owned farmland as far as the eye can see. 

My mother-in-law, Betty, grew up in her grandmother’s house next door. They didn’t have electricity until she was 12 years old and used a horse before they purchased a car.

Bill was raised with his large family across the Lake. Ten years apart in age, they met shortly after Betty graduated from high school and the rest is history. 

They moved to Chesapeake, VA to give their four children more opportunities and moved right back to retire in Fairfield the second my husband graduated high school more than 30 years ago. 

Bill passed away in the home when our oldest, Aurora, was only 4 months old. Betty has remained, ever since. 

Yes, this house and its land was so much more than any-old home. 

It’s where our little family spent every single Easter and Thanksgiving. 

This is where our girls picked figs, peaches and pears in the Summer and grapes, apples and pecans in the Fall. 

This is where they learned to ride a 3-wheeler, shoot a gun, and befriend a domesticated deer named Jane Doe. 

This is the place my children bottle fed lambs and calves, where we roasted oysters over open fire and dyed easter eggs. 

Fairfield Methodist Church is where all four of our girls were baptized. It’s where they listened to their Granny play the piano and received treats for the children’s sermon. 

When I close my eyes, I feel the soft wind brush my hair. The air is filled with the scent of ripe figs so visceral, I can taste them. I hear the crunch of the pecan hulls underneath my feet and soak in the stunning sunset over the pier my husband built in the lake. 

Yes, this home is more than just any-old-house. 

It’s a symphony of senses. 

It’s a holder of some of our family’s most precious memories that we will carry with us for a lifetime. 

Today we said our final goodbye to Granny’s farm. 

Forever we will say thank you. 

BOB

Posted on by Lauren

Lost amidst the busyness of our everyday lives, it came and went as suddenly and normally as weekly groceries, this event I had so built-up in my mind. 

For over 13 years, our BOB stroller occupied precious space in our garage. It’s role and value not to be underestimated. 

It carried our first, second, third and last-born. 

To the park, across the beach, along rugged, rocky trails in Maine, Costa Rica and the Carolinas. This stroller has rolled through airports, water parks and Disney World. Her wheels have traversed through rain, mud, snow and sand and although one daughter, along the way, bucked through the straps breaking them for good, our stroller safely contained each child.

From an infant in Stroller Strides for eight incredible years to an 8 year old’s backpack hitching a ride to-and-from the walking zone of our elementary school, our stroller has never failed us. 

And just like that, she was claimed by a new family and gone, yesterday. 

She honorably and dutifully served us and now, she rolls on with new rear ends to hold and sidewalks to explore. 

We thank her for her loyalty and service and wish her light loads and a gentle retirement. 

BOB, you will forever have our hearts. 

Brave

Posted on by Lauren

I only knew to ask because I had already lost someone to suicide. 

Every story is different. 

But the common theme is, 

No one ever saw it coming. 

So, how do we change it? How do we help?

We courageously ask:

Have you thought of ending your life?

It’s a terrifying ask because we don’t want to hear the answer I heard:

“Yes. Last month.”

All I could think is Thank God I didn’t wait a minute longer to tell this person:

You’re not alone. 

We are not giving up on you, even when you give up on yourself. 

It takes bravery to ask and for them to answer. 

It’s June now, but May we all be so brave to ask.

Just ask.

Sad

Posted on by Lauren

“You don’t get to tell me about “sad”.”

Anyone who has lost someone will tell you that grief is non-linear.

Some days you realize it’s been several hours since you thought of your loved one which then triggers a new wave of sadness, realizing how the passing time has shaped your grief. 

Grief surprises my family at any point, all throughout any regular day. 

Nights are the most challenging, when my daughters lie down to sleep and miss their bunny brother. 

Walking into the living room to see the empty fireplace where he sat upon his throne is hardest for me. And the other morning before school, when I went to grab a glass bowl out of the cupboard and realized it was the one we used as his water dish. I openly wept.

I had to correct my husband, someone who has never owned a pet before, when he referenced the point in time when we would “get over” our loss of Oreo. 

No. 

That’s simply not how grief works. 

You never, ever “get over” the loss. 

Instead, I recently came across an article about grief as a ball in a box that contains a pain button. In the beginning, the ball is large and almost always triggers the pain but in time, the ball gets smaller, hitting that grief button less often. Still, the intensity of the pain of the loss never dulls. It’s as if it just happened, no matter how much time has passed. 

When we first heard the shocking, tragic news, I encouraged my girls to grieve openly. Not to hide. Suppressing only prolongs. We wailed and howled. Each girl took turns collapsing into my arms; sometimes, I held all four at once. We were away from home and we were broken. 

Others nearby thought a close human family member must have died. When they learned it was “just” our rabbit, they were relieved and had a hard time understanding the intensity and duration of our sadness. 

“I’m sorry our grief makes you uncomfortable.” I quickly retorted.  

But I will never apologize for the open expression of our sadness. 

“You don’t get to tell me about “sad”.” -Taylor Swift “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?”

Camille Vaughan Photography

Magic

Posted on by Lauren

“Dying on your couch while watching TV by yourself is a tragedy. Dying while doing something you love with every part of your body is magic. I wish you magic.”*

The entire premise of my New Leaf Parenting blog is that “Every Day is a Fresh Start”. There’s a lesson to be found in every great or minute facet of life. 

But sometimes there is tragedy.

As humans, I believe we are built to persevere, to overcome, even in the darkest of times. Surely survivors of The Holocaust and modern atrocities have taught us that. If they survived, we must. 

The truth is, the wind was knocked out of my lungs when my friend called to tell me she had discovered that our pet died the morning after we had left for our longest-ever 10 day vacation. 

He was “just a rabbit”. Not a human, not a dog or cat. Just a rabbit that happened to be my first pet since losing my precious dog to a rattlesnake bite when I was 12 years old. 

He was our first family pet, purchased at the beginning of the pandemic when we decided to homeschool our four daughters then ages, 2, 4, 6 and 8. 

We called him our “therapy rabbit” because he was forever patient- if the girls were loud, he would form into a “loaf”, blocking out the obnoxious sound. When the girls were sad, he would recline next to them, offering unlimited pets. They would nuzzle their face into his and he accepted their grief without question. 

He was my morning coffee buddy and my late-night snuggler. 

He died because he escaped his enclosure, unnoticed before we left town. Our last security video shows me and my husband ensuring his safe keeping but unbeknownst to us, he made his escape and met his end by another animal that night. 

I lie awake, thinking about his tragic, painful, lonely end. Was he scared? Did he feel betrayed by us for leaving town? 

He was so good to us, he deserved better. 

But then I read fiction to escape reality and come across quotes like the one above and I wonder, did he know we were leaving? 

Did he leave before he was left? Not knowing the dangers that lurked in the darkness?

Sometimes there is tragedy and no good lesson to be found. 

But I think I’ll sleep better if I believe Oreo died rebelling, refusing to be domesticated a day longer.

I think I’ll sleep better if I believe in magic. 

I wish you magic. 

* Napolitano, Anne. Dear Edward. New York. Random House. 2020.

The Golden Door

Posted on by Lauren

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

– Emma Lazarus

My father is first generation American. 

Italian, born and bred. 

So, when I graduated high school I asked for proof. 

In other words, bring me to them. 

My relatives.  

We traveled first to Rome. 

A hotel, he’d booked online.

We’d spent exactly two nights ever together in a lifetime and suddenly, 

we were residing in a closet.

On to Naples, Pompeii and Calabria: the place of my grandfather’s birth. 

Rich with olive trees, oil and seven-layer fresh lasagna. 

Here, I bonded with my foreign relatives as I screamed “Aye! Aye! Aye!” on motorbike 

through winding streets, experiencing food like it was the first time.  

Eating “al fresca”, pretending I followed their animated conversation. 

Next, to Sicily where we knocked on many a neighbor door 

until we stood in the room my grandmother was born in 1898.  

I looked around and wondered, “how?”. 

And here I am.

Standing in my father’s hospital room wondering, “how?”

If there was ever a man to give to the tired, the poor, 

Those that needed to breathe and required refuge, 

He’s right here. 

Beside the golden door.

And here I am. 

Standing in my father’s hospital room wondering, “how?”.

A Life Well Lived

Posted on by Lauren

We were born 20 days apart with just 2 houses sitting between our own.  My dad taught him how to swim; his dad taught me how to ride a bike.  

We were always outside, waiting for the tell-tale whistle from his parents at dusk, letting us know it was time to come in for dinner and bed. 

In our early teens, he would climb the tree in front of my house, clamber up the roof and knock.  There was a landing just outside of my window and we would sit there, contemplating life until we were caught.  

His parents had been married just shy of 45 years when his mom succumbed to cancer this past September. 

The funeral was held in late October and just 5 days later, with the fragrance of the funeral flowers still permeating the living room, his dad passed away from sudden cardiac arrest, right into my friend’s arms.  It was two days before their 45th anniversary and we all collectively knew, he had died from a broken heart. 

My mother and I had wept during Mr. White’s eulogy for his wife.  He spoke of their first date- when Mrs. White had invited him to lie underneath a Christmas tree to watch the twinkling lights. 

Mr. White then compared those twinkling lights to the thousands upon thousands of prayers family and friends had sent up to God as cancer ravaged his beloved’s body.

And then, just like that, he was gone, too. 

My friend and I stood in the kitchen where he had administered CPR to his dad, just hours before and we hugged, screamed and sobbed.  At 39 years-old we still felt like children, never ever having been in his parents’ house without them there.  

Shocked and numb, I drove away, contemplating the loss. 

Mr. White’s eulogy had been full of love and awe for his wife and the life they had shared. 

And I wondered, 

“What is a well-lived life?”  

Have I lived one? 

Am I living one?

In this distracted day-in-age, it feels all too easy to lose sight of the most important part of life:

Our connection to others. 

And if that is the meaning of life, 

Then I’ve lived it well.  

Let us all lie under the Christmas tree and watch the twinkling lights. 

Never Forgotten

Posted on by Lauren

What about the ones who never were?

Who would they have been?

What if it feels like they were already here?

When we first learned of their existence.

Sure they never were born of this Earth, 

But for a time, they were alive.  

And for many, it will always be this way. 

Mourning the loss of what-if.  

Who would they have become?

Years pass, 

And yet, they are still there.  

Always with us. 

Never forgotten. 

Camille Vaughan Photography

Love and Loss

Posted on by Lauren

“Unable are the loved to die.

For love is immortality.”

-Emily Dickinson

Looking around, questioning the validity of everything I sense.  What it must feel to walk on the moon. Like I’m floating out of this world.  Not really here, but watching from the outside in.  This is how it feels to live after loss.

And the more I realize I’m actually here, and she’s not, the more painful the reality becomes. Words like unfair.  Too soon. And Why plague my mind.

The phrase “Be Kind for everyone is fighting a hard battle.”  takes on a new meaning.

Suddenly, that asshole on the road is just another poor bastard doing the best he can.

And my child’s fit, is just that: a fit that will pass.

Love and Loss like spaghetti and meatballs, peanut butter and jelly- one not without the other.

And for a time, Kelly and Lauren.  Best friends forever.

Rest In Peace my sweet friend.  You are loved.

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Lemonade

Posted on by Lauren

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You know the saying, “When life hands you lemons . . . ”  It’s a saying that was branded into every fiber of my body at a very young age; a side effect of having a mother who traveled the country as a motivational speaker.  Growing up, no setback was too high for me to overcome.  “No one can make you feel a certain way.  You choose how you allow others to impact you.”

It’s great advice, most of the time.  But sometimes . .  sometimes. . . life hands you lemons and they are sour and bitter and no amount of sugar can turn them into lemonade.

As someone who has been raised to always find the silver linings, this realization doesn’t sit well with me.  I constantly search for the good in any crappy situation, even if it takes years to discover it.

But what do you do when you are rendered helpless in situations that are completely out of your control?  Cancer. Car accidents. Infidelity. Violent crimes. Natural disasters. Infertility. PTSD. Abandonment. Mean people. Death.

As much as you try to focus on all of the good that you have to be thankful for in your life, sometimes, a terrible situation is just that and there’s no pot of gold to be found.

It’s a tough pill to swallow- this notion that it’s not going to get better.  That it’s not going to work out the way you thought it would.  And that this bad thing is not going to politely go away so you can drink your lemonade and move on with your life.

Instead, it becomes one of “the things we carry”.  Unable to place it in a box and set it on the top shelf of our closet, it is with us wherever we go, like a meddlesome pebble caught in our shoe.

If we focused on it all of the time, we literally would be rendered helpless.  So we trudge onward, painfully recognizing it when something triggers a reminder.

I used to believe my mother, that nothing was beyond our capacity to overcome.  But now, I realize that some things are not made to be good.  Like the bad spot on a banana, you can eat around it, but it’s not going to make it go away.  A bad spot is a bad spot is a bad spot.

And it’s good and healthy to call it what it is as opposed to forcing yourself to drink lemonade when you fucking hate lemonade.

It’s a lemon. It’s sour. And bitter. And sad.  And we carry them wherever we go.