And I'm trying...really, I am. But it's very hard for me - or anyone in my family - to be happy on April 12.
Today, all I want to do is curl up in a corner and cry.
Or go for a long walk and remember.
Because nine years ago today, my brother Dennis died from a brain tumor. He was 45.
And I miss him, and I wonder if we did all we could to save him, and I wonder what he'd be doing today had he lived.
And I wonder if I'll ever be able to get through April 12th without crying.
A year after Dennis' death, I started volunteering with Hospice. One of the books given to all families who use the services of Hospice is called Gone from My Sight, and it contains a great poem.
Today, and on every April 12, I read this poem, and I try to remember that while I cry over my loss, there are others who are laughing and celebrating because he's made it to their shore.
Gone from my sight Henry Van Dyke
I am standing on the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sales to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength. I stand and watch her until at length, she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says: 'There, she is gone!'
Gone where?" I ask.
Gone from my sight, that is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side, and she is just as able to bear the load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just at the moment when someone at my side says, 'There, she is gone!', there are other eyes watching her coming and other voices ready to take up the glad shout: 'Here she comes!'
And that is dying.
Dennis loved Easter and Spring...and so I continue to try to be happy on Easter...but it's difficult.
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