Sunday, July 25, 2021

Sunday, July 25, 2021

Tonight's picture was taken on July 25, 2009, the last birthday I celebrated with Mattie. That day, Peter's parents and Mattie constructed a lighthouse birthday card for me. As they all knew how much I loved lighthouses. In fact that card was to resemble Bodie Light in North Carolina, which we took Mattie to several times. 

Quote of the day: Today's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins.

• Number of people diagnosed with the virus: 34,436,400
• Number of people who died from the virus: 610,886

Today may have been my birthday, but it did not feel that way. I was in no mood! Spent most of the day sorting and organizing our walk-in closet at our townhouse in DC. I truly do not like change, even on a good day. But I am comfortable in our townhouse and I know where everything is, I have a system that has worked for years. Moving upsets my apple cart on many, many levels. Though the house is much bigger than the townhouse, in my mind, I can't even picture where my things will go! I am so used to them in the walk-in closet in Mattie's room. So this not only irritates me but makes me anxious. I have spent two days working on that closet, and have made excellent headway. I have thrown out two very large garden trash bags of paper and things, and have set aside five garden sized trash bags for donation this week. I figure tackling a closet and several drawers a little at a time is the only way I can manage this!  

Peter went to the house today! Here is another before and after photo! I happen to be a non-blue person. I don't have anything against blue per se, it just doesn't make me happy. The former owner selected colors that just do not go with my color palate. Starting with her very dark dining room. The walls had wallpaper and as you can see the chair rails and molding had a darker blue color. You should have seen how dark this room was with the curtains on the windows. When the painters removed the wallpaper, there was acrylic paint textured by plastic wrap all over the walls. It looked like metallic stucco. Honestly it was horrid, and the painters told me that was an expensive technique. Either case, we paid for both the wallpaper to be removed and for the walls to be brought back to their smooth texture. This room was a show!

Here is the after photo, with the walls smooth and painted with Medici ivory. The chair rails and moldings all have a semi-gloss of extra white. The color just brightens the room!

Meanwhile, in the process of cleaning out, I came across the programs we created for Mattie's funeral and celebration of life ceremony. Naturally I kept them, but I have to say that much of Mattie's funeral was a blur. 

Inside of the funeral program. What I do remember is that the church gave me a hard time finding a date for the service. That was until I got a hold of my friend Jim, who is a priest. I met Jim at the George Washington university, and he gave me my very first client, as he supervised me at the Newman Center on campus. Jim is a gifted priest and has a significant position within the church system now. So though he was in Pennsylvania when Mattie died, he came back to DC to preside over Mattie's  funeral. Jim also baptized Mattie in 2002. 

Mattie's celebration of life program. 

Inside the Celebration of Life program. I remember arranging for a children's room at the reception. As many of Mattie's friends were 7 years old, and we felt it was important for them to have a safe space to be children and to remember their friend in their own way. I reached out to several of my graduate assistants, and they coordinated this space and were on hand if something arose for the children. 

Mattie's funeral and celebration of life were held about a month after he died. I literally needed all that time, to pull it together both physically and emotionally. 

This illustrates Mattie's whimsy! While at the hospital, he colored his socks and added googly eyes! I have about 4 to 5 plastic bins of Mattie items, mementoes, clothes, and art work. One thing I feel good about, is that these bins still are meaningful and relevant to me today! Which means that my sorting and organizing over the years was well done. 

I came across these laminated cards today. The top blue and yellow cards were our pool passes. As a faculty member of the university, this gave me pool privileges. It was at the university's pool that we taught Mattie to swim. 

The bottom two cards came from Mattie's preschool. The school assigned the children a shape that started with the same first letter of a child's name. So Mattie's first year in preschool he was Mattie Moon. The second year, he was Mattie Magnet! Who knew that Mattie Moon was going to have even more significant meaning to us beyond preschool!