Saturday, September 12, 2015

Saturday, September 12, 2015

Tonight's picture was taken on September 2008. This was before any of Mattie's surgeries as you can see he was freely using his right arm. Mattie was in the hospital's outpatient clinic and doing what he loved.... creating and designing with clay. Mattie was forming a boat and inside the boat he put stick people. Mattie could create at that table for hours, as long as he was given the freedom to design from within. If someone else tried to direct his art or tell him what to do, that wouldn't have work out! Fortunately Mattie had Jenny and Jessie (his art therapists) who believed and valued this freedom of expression and realized through this freedom Mattie was then able to build trust and rapport with them and communicate about his feelings with them. 


Quote of the day: When one loses a child, is it really ever over? ~ From Downtown Abbey

This week, Peter and I received this beautiful tribute collage through Facebook. It was designed by Timothy Beck. Tim lives in Phoenix and devotes his creativity to bringing happiness to families whose children have cancer. Tim designs these tributes on his own accord and then sends them to families. He has created hundreds of them and they are very much appreciated by families. I know we loved seeing it this week, on Mattie's anniversary. Tim selected the photos on his own accord from Mattie's blog and then designed this composition. Here is some information on Tim that he posted on Facebook:

If I have ever created anything for your child, the seed for its creation was officially planted on this day, 6 years ago. From August 3rd, 2009 to December 15th, 2010, I spent Monday evening in the oncology playroom of Phoenix Children's Hospital.

Because it was the last volunteer shift of the day, quite often only a handful of children would be in there; which in turn provided a more intimate experience. I made gem bracelets with the girls; played computer games with the boys; built a virtual zoo for the little ones; among other things; all while dancing around IV poles, drip lines, and electrical cords.

To say it was life changing would be a huge understatement. As a result, I cannot allow my integrity to be put into question. The unfortunate position of having to defend it has been and will continue to be vigorously refuted. Luckily these incidents have been few and far between.

With all of that said, I want each of you to know that my passion and heartache is neither feigned nor exaggerated. As I have said before, this isn't a hobby or a stepping stone to something bigger. It is exactly as you see it. And although my pain is not your pain, it is nonetheless every bit as genuine.

This evening Peter and I took a walk to the Kennedy Center. By day I have terrible noise of construction on my deck and by the evening hours, we have horrible noise coming from the Kennedy Center. This is the first year they have held an outdoor event like this, which has been going on for over a week. The event features skateboards. It reminds of something I would see by the beach. Basically skateboarders are skating up and down ramps, to live music. Music that is enough to make you want to put on ear plugs. The event is free and people sit in stands to watch the skateboarding and to hear the music. 

This event draws a lot of people, and I was stunned to see people standing in line today to get into this event. The event is free, but to me it generates noise pollution for its neighbors. During the week, the event runs until 9pm and on the weekends this sound continues to 10pm. I have had a full week of intense noise starting at 7:30am with drilling and construction until 9pm, when the Kennedy Center finally goes dark and shuts down the skateboarding event. 

By day it was grey and raining, yet by tonight we were treated to a Mattie Miracle sky. The sun was reflecting brilliantly on the Potomac River.