Windows
Today is Sunday. It is one-degree below zero. I sit on the arm of an empty loveseat with my feet tucked under me, snug in three pair of socks. I am cozy, warm and safe in casual sweats, although there will be no sweating today. When I saw you fall, it was on a Monday, hot and humid, the weather you liked best.
Today, I am warm and safe but my dear, bird friends are famished and near frozen. I feel as though it is my fault. I gaze at them outside the window as they flutter and fall from the two unfilled feeders that are groaning in the wind. They are searching for whatever they can find to sustain life and provide hope.
The wind is howling; near blizzard conditions exist. I see nothing but white and the birds at the two unfilled feeders. Snowdrifts outside the door are three-feet high and growing. I try to force the door open so that I can feed them, but without success. I was always told that God would take care of the birds. (Matthew 6:26: “Look at the birds. They don’t need to plant or harvest or put food in barns because your heavenly Father feeds them. And you are far more valuable to him than they are.)”
When it was hot and humid, I saw you start to fall. Your arms stretched out in front of you, and I thought you were clowning. Then your arms dropped to your sides and you tumbled forward like a stack of building blocks when a child places one on top, slightly off balance. I still thought you were clowning. As I drew near, I saw your handsome face embedded into the gravel of the driveway, and sharp stones violated the surface of your skin. Ever so gently, I lifted and turned your head just enough to see the blood. I knew you were not clowning.
For three days, the children and I curled up around you and snuggled close around the hospital bed. They told you stories, relived happy times and burst first into laughter and then into tears. We sang songs as if we were desperately trying to drum into you all the love we could muster before you had to go. Michele was courageous enough to tell you to go when you saw the light. And on the third day, when the respirator was removed, a tear tumbled from your eye when I reminded you of Michele’s words. When I hurried for help, I was told the tear was only a reflex, but I knew it was a sign—a sign that you didn’t want to go.
I was always told that God would take care of me, and now I was a bird being blown in the wind and famished in the storm. I was blinded by grief. Everything was white, and I couldn’t see. I didn’t eat. I was a bird at an unfilled feeder, and it was one degree below zero. There is so much to learn both when it is hot and humid and when it is one-degree below zero.
When it was hot and humid, I backed the riding lawnmower into the cluttered shed with the mower deck still rotating, and fragments of wood and glass flew by my face and whirled around my head in the small space of the shed. I buried my face in my arms and wondered what I had done wrong.
The wind and snow are relentless; the wind chill is thirty-below zero. The birds refuse to leave the unfilled feeders, so I must feed them. I open the inside door and push on the frozen storm door, but it will not budge. I kick it until it opens enough for me to thrust my hand through the narrow opening. Tossing the birdseed into the wind, I watch it blow and whirl. The birds must find the seed soon or the blowing snow will cover it.
Once more, I sit on the love seat, recalling the days when it was hot and humid. I motion for the birds to leave the unfilled feeders and fly around the evergreen to feast on the seeds outside the door. Silly me, of course they don’t want to come close to the door, but that is where the seed is. I begin to despair that they will ever find the seed. When you went away, I felt much the same; I was lost and blowing in the wind.
When it was hot and humid, I tumbled into a pit of grief. A gentle shepherd was passing by my pit, and I recognized his voice and knew if I could only pull myself up high enough to touch his robe, that he would heal me. Instead, he reached down and pulled me out. He walked with me to a meadow with green pastures where I rested my weary head on his chest while he filled my soul with love and hope. It was on that day, when he lifted me out of the pit of grief, that he planted the seed of his love. If only the birds can find their way through the snow and around the evergreen, they will find his love, too.
After flopping around aimlessly in the storm for what seemed like hours, the birds finally began to find their way through the evergreen and over the snow where at last they found the seeds. First one, then another, and yet another, until they were all gathered outside the door, picking up the seeds, their little beaks chomping, hulls now blowing in the wind.
In the storm, it took time for the birds to find the seed on the other side of the evergreen. It took you three days to leave us after you fell when it was hot and humid. The seed of love planted in my heart, slowly began to grow, and even before it blossomed, I knew God would take care of the birds, and I knew God would take care of me. I am now able to advance through the forest, to move beyond the mountains, to wade across the stream and then, not through, but around the evergreen.
About the Author
In June of 2006, I was active in helping form a grief support group for the parish church I attended. I was thrilled to be given an opportunity to companion others in their walk through grief. After my husband, Tom, died in 1993, and as a way of thanking God for his presence in my “new normal” life, I volunteered at the Hospice Home of Northeast Indiana where I did a wide variety of tasks. I was also an active member of Toastmaster, International for several years. My heart’s desire is to continue to companion others in their journey through grief by facilitating at our group meetings and by writing