I am pensive and tearful today, thinking about a good friend who died yesterday. Christine and I have been friends more years than I can remember. We played harp together, did programs together, shared health through Japanese Nikken together, and even went to Hawaii together. It is strange to think that she’s not here to talk to, to ask questions of, to get advice from. I always appreciated her good cheer, her grounded wisdom, and her unqualified acceptance of me and others. She loved God and she loved people. She was ALWAYS doing things for others. Always.
When someone leaves this world, it is an experience that leaves me in awe. They were here, and now they’re not. Chris died on the way to church. On Saturday, the day before, it was a ‘normal’ day (well, as normal as can be for someone who is badly hurting and so very, very ill). I had taken her to the bank, written checks for her, got her 3 cubes of ice, and rubbed her back. Now she’s gone. But I know she is still ‘there’ and she’s in a place where our spirits go when we leave our bodies on the earth. (As I mentioned in my book, Scott’s Choice, I have actually felt my husband’s hand, so I know for sure that his soul or spirit or essence still exists).
Chris is now out of the pain she was in for four years (never telling anyone of her struggle, just fighting it on her own, the way she lived her whole adult life). Now she can see her father and mother, Kira (for whom our harp album is named), countless others, and maybe even Turlough O’Carolan, the famous Irish harpist! And one of those standing in line to greet her will be my husband, with arms outstretched and a big grin on his face, welcoming her to the next stage of her life.