Monthly Archives: April 2014

Easter

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easter_eggs_1

Easter has always been about friends and family at our house. A four day feeding frenzy that kicks off on Good Friday with Georgie’s legendary homemade hot cross buns. The gift of a four day weekend is such a welcome reprieve after the stress of another dark winter filled with work and sports and snow… always the snow… to shovel, to slip in, to curse at!

Easter is also the first true gathering of the Clan since Christmas. That short pause – between a winter filled with hockey games, dance recitals, soccer, and track meets and the launch of greenhouse season and a summer spent at the Farmer’s Market – finally providing an opportunity for everyone to gather.

Helping

On Friday, the Grandparents host an Easter egg extravaganza – Rusty boils up dozens of eggs and the grandkids surround the kitchen table, creating a rainbow of dyed masterpieces for the parents to ooh and ahhh over.

Greg rarely makes it to the egg dying – he always needs to be the first guy through the door at the annual Draggins Rod and Custom Show. This will be his first year without his car buddy Jordan by his side.

A group of close friends started an annual egg hunt and brunch tradition that lasted for many years. Lucas and Jordan loved it so much they insisted on hiding eggs around the greenhouse before Sunday dinner for all the little cousins to find. Or not. I think Grandpa Rusty still periodically unearths a plastic egg filled with melted goodies!

egg hunt

The highlight of the weekend though, the one “can’t miss” event – is Grandma’s made from scratch hot cross buns. I am in awe of this wonderful woman who can churn out as many as 20 dozen buns in one day! The kids and grandkids burn their fingers grabbing the fresh out of the oven buns, smothering them in icing sugar and eating till they end up rolling around the living room – their stomachs ready to explode.

One of the many things Jordan’s illness robbed him of, and the one that caused him the most heartache, was having to miss several of the last few Easter’s. It is the one thing he could never forgive me for – as it was usually my actions that precipitated him being in treatment and therefore away from his family.

Last April, the very first thing Jordan did when he got home was to head to Grandma’s to spend a day baking bread and buns with her. He was absolutely joyful when he returned home bearing his creations. And that’s what I will be thinking of today – the joy that Easter brought him.

breadbuns

Sweet Dreams

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I can count on one hand the number of times I have dreamed of Jordan since his death. The first time he simply hung around in the background – I was aware of his presence but he didn’t speak and I couldn’t really see him; I just knew he was there. In the second dream he and I were in the kitchen, pulling dishes from the cupboard for him to take to his new place. (Not hard to read the symbolism  in that one). Last night I dreamed I was at our cabin. I was outside, and the place was packed with people. While there seemed to be many people there that I didn’t know, I didn’t mind really mind as I was busy serving wine to my Clothes Club.

A car pulled up, I turned to look and there were Jordan and Lucas getting out of the vehicle. I went to Jordan immediately and wrapped my arms around him for a very long, very tight embrace. We didn’t speak; I just stood with my arms wrapped around him, my heart filled with love.

And then I was in the kitchen, trying to figure out how to feed all these people with only one container of Costco potato salad and those President’s Choice crackers with fennel and cranberry. I felt like Marlo Thomas in the episode of “That Girl” when she improvises appetizers by spreading peanut butter on individual corn chips. (Isn’t the brain astonishing? I can’t remember a conversation I had two weeks ago, but I can recall with absolute clarity an episode from a 1960’s sitcom!).

I woke from my dream feeling such a sense of peace. I laid there for a good twenty minutes, replaying and re-experiencing that hug. In my dream Jordan was wearing the blue tank top from the picture I posted in my last blog. So the logical side of my brain is insisting that I summoned the dream forth from those memories. But the right side of my brain, the part that helps me recall “That Girl”, believes it was more spiritual than that.

My heart and I – well, we are content to simply be grateful it happened.

Hope is a Crocus

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crocus

Like everyone else, I have been desperate for this seemingly endless, bitter cold grey winter to be over. My grieving heart has been literally aching for the snow to melt and for spring to arrive. Then the first Cancer Society Daffodils arrived at the hospital and I found myself plunged into memories of Jordan.

How could I have forgotten how intimately spring and Jordan were entwined? He was always the first one into shorts and flip flops. Pushing his Grandpa to get the greenhouse open so he could plant his tomatoes. The greenhouse was always a safe haven for Jordan, a place of peace and contentment. From the time he could first reach the potting shelf, he has spent every spring with his hands in the soil, surrounded by the love of his grandparents. green 1j and coffee

 

 

 

 

 

“All through the long winter, I dream of my garden.
On the first day of spring, I dig my fingers deep into the soft earth.
I can feel its energy, and my spirits soar.”
— Helen Hayes

It was always Jordan who raked our lawn, turned the flower beds, assembled the patio furniture. Once Niko arrived in our lives, Jordan’s spring ritual included long walks along the river, searching to find and photograph the first crocuses. What courage  it takes to be a crocus. To push up through the frozen icy ground and trust that there will be enough sunshine to keep you alive. Did Jordan find strength and encouragement in nature’s persistence? When he witnessed that first crocus pushing up through the snow did he see it as a message hope?

groundj and niko ground

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last weekend we washed the dust and dirt from the deck and set the furniture up. I turned and caught a glimpse of the chairs and found myself doubled over in grief, weeping at the sudden memory of Jordan lounging in the chair, enjoying the first sunshine of spring. Grief continues to be such a sneaky bastard. chair2

And so I fill the house with daffodils and tulips and try to see the memories that are flooding in as a gift, regardless of the pain they cause. And soon Niko and I will head out to explore the Meewasin pathways – searching for our own signs of hope.

 “There is a sacredness in tears. They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love”

(Washington Irving)