Returning Waves

When Good-bye is not forever

Since Olaf’s post about losing his friend, I’ve reflected on those people who touch us, however briefly, and how we can be enriched in the most unexpected ways.

I enjoy the beach and watching the waves roll into the shore and how they rescend back out to the ocean. I’ve tried to “catch” a wave on a surf board, but I’ve never been able to hold onto one for long.

After our friend at the Assisted Living facility passed, I thought about how sometimes people in our lives are like that. A wave crashing to shore for a moment that can’t be held long.

When we think we’ve said good-bye to a retreating wave, it’s nice to remember that it can come back in surprising and glorious ways.

Photo Courtesy of Pexels.com

A gift from my Mother’s and Grandparent’s Wave

Four years ago, Olaf and I walked out of the house.¹ I noticed an older truck parked in front, with a young couple pointing at my house. Sometimes people stop and look at the cables or colors of this old house.

I walked down the stairs, then the couple smiled at me. The young man, rolled down his window², and said, “My wife’s grandmother used to live here.”

I was quite surprised. My grandparents lived here. She had her grandmother’s journal, with my address on the inside cover. She carefully handed the journal to me. When I saw her grandmother’s name, everything clicked for me. Her grandmother, Ingrid, was my mother’s best friend, and cousin. I knew Ingrid’s’s story well. My grandfather was able to get his family back to America before the Nazi’s occupied Norway. Ingrid’s family didn’t get out.

After the war, my mother heard Ingrid’s painful story. Ingrid fell in love with a teenage German boy. A soldier. The enemy. Ingrid’s family tried to protect her, but Ingrid was ostracized by her neighbor’s and friends. She fled the country. And my grandparents took her in....

I never knew. My grandfather nor my mother never told me she lived here, until she could find her way in this foreign land.

My mother’s dearest cousin’s granddaughter--came to the house because her grandmother loved my mom and her parents so much. A wave returned after 75 years.

I’m grateful I know another aspect of my grandparents’ compassion. I’m so grateful this young couple came to our house.

Another visitor

Yesterday, a woman who was in one of my sexual abuse survivors’ groups dropped by. I knew this woman well in the early 90s. When Paperdolls was picked up by the national publisher she traveled with me to their offices. Special arrangements were made for me to meet Gloria Steinem and personally thank her for endorsing the book.

I considered this woman a close friend. Yet, after Karen Fisher died, I threw myself into work and we lost touch.

Yesterday, when she first approached, she was uncertain I would remember her. As soon as she started talking I instantly recognized her. Of course I remembered her! What a gift! Gone for a time, but not forever.

Another survivor who has carved our her own uniquely beautiful life.

There are many of us. Please remember, you are not alone. You can do this. You can heal and grow, and create your own authentic life.

Last night, I built a fire, and remembered one of my favorite poems, by JRR Tolkien:³

I sit beside the fire and think
of all that I have seen
of meadow-flowers and butterflies
in summers that have been;

Of yellow leaves and gossamer
in autumns that there were,
with morning mist and silver sun
and wind upon my hair.

I sit beside the fire and think
of how the world will be
when winter comes without a spring
that I shall ever see.

For still there are so many things
that I have never seen:
in every wood in every spring
there is a different green.

I sit beside the fire and think
of people long ago
and people who will see a world
that I shall never know.

But all the while I sit and think
of times there were before,
I listen for returning feet
and voices at the door.

RECORDING by Hunter Hamlyn

I’m not advocating sitting around waiting for people to approach or come back, but sometimes, gifts of connection and re-connection can be given when we least expect them. Sometimes good bye isn’t forever. And sometimes we are connected with those we cannot see.⁴

1. Ironically, We were on our way to visit our friend at the Assisted Living Palce.

2. Literally rolled the window down, it was that old of a truck

3. This poem is also included in Paperdolls & Cowboy Boots, approx pg 170-171

4. “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry