Sunday, February 3, 2013

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Tonight's picture was taken in January of 2003. Mattie was nine months old and eating a cracker. But the priceless thing about this photo was Mattie was staring right at me, intrigued by the camera. In fact, Mattie was fascinated by ALL lights (such as the flash of a camera or electric light). Mattie's first word ever was CAT, but his second and third were LIGHT and BUBBLE!

Quote of the day: Blessed are those who can give without remembering and take without forgetting. ~ Elizabeth Bibesco

I came across this quote tonight and it resonated with me. I must admit I am much better at the latter part of the quote rather than the former. I sometimes wonder why others in my life can move on and yet I remain entrenched on where I am in both thoughts and feelings. Part of it has to do exactly with the sentiments of this quote. When Mattie was sick, people gave us SO much of their time, energy, and resources. Therefore based on the circumstances we did a lot of "taking." But taking for me comes with gratitude and a memory. Peter jokes that I have a mind like a steel trap for some things, and he would be correct. I am NOT so good with the memorization of long term facts and matter of fact knowledge. However, if the the content involves emotion, the connection between people, and human dynamics, then rest assured it has been filed in my emotional memory bank. I can recall usually what people have said to me, to one another, what place and context it took place in, and so forth. I assure you this skill has its advantages and great disadvantages.  

Peter and I worked the day away on Foundation items. One of the things we are doing in California in February, besides sponsoring a psychosocial think tank, is we were offered an exhibit table at this national conference. This is a first for us, at least in terms of traveling a distance with our materials. So literally I have to think strategically about what Foundation merchandise to bring based on the number of people projected to attend, and of course I have to box it and ship it to the hotel. The box I am using seems about as big as I am. So I am packing it carefully and trying to determine how to transport it into the post office. I look forward to sharing with you pictures of our exhibit table set up on the blog in February. Peter and I are very fortunate to have our friends Denise and Dave flying to California to help us at the think tank and at the exhibit table. These two individuals are not only Mattie Miracle supporters, but their daughter, Marisa, was one of the wonderful young people who helped me with caregiving for Mattie when he was home between hospital stays in the summer of 2009. Marisa is also the person who has coordinated our Foundation bake sale three years in a row. Marisa's whole family is instrumental to us and supports us in countless ways. So when they offered to come to California to help us, we weren't only beyond appreciative, but we decided to accept their help. Asking for assistance is not always my strong suit, especially when all of our help is voluntary. I prefer people to initiate the help, and when they do, chances are I am right on board to accept it! So you will be seeing pictures of all four of us on our conference adventure in February!

At some point Peter and I stopped working and we went out for a diversion. We had tea and coffee together and just chatted. For me some days are better than others, and yesterday just seemed depressing. I don't know if it was the cold weather, the snow, or the continual realization that our weekends are SO different from others in our lives. In fact, tonight I was downstairs in our complex doing laundry. I figured who would be doing laundry on Super Bowl Sunday? Well there were others down there besides me, but one of my neighbors said to me that only us "old" folks would be down there on a night like tonight. Mind you I apparently fall into the "old" folks category. I believe this is what happens to us because we lost Mattie. Our lives appear to be that of an empty nester, except in our case we haven't had the ups, downs, and joy of child rearing, and we will never see Mattie again.