“I have long wanted to teach on that particular passage of Scripture because of my love of boating and the water. I don’t know why I’ve saved it this long. But this seemed like the right time.”
“It was perfect. Thank you.”
“It was an honor.”
The kids begin joking and laughing, which is like salve on my battered mother-soul. Tember’s face lights up when she notices the table of snacks and drinks set out for us: bottles of Snapple, full-size candy bars, and SunChips—name-brand stuff, not the cheap house-brand snacks I occasionally stock in our pantry.
“Are all these for us?” she asks, wide-eyed. No one has eaten since early this morning.
“Yes, I think so, honey,” I say. “Help yourself.”
“Wow!” Her eyes pop, and she reaches for a bag of chips.
When we load into the minivan to head home, I notice my purse seems unusually heavy. Looking inside, I discover a Snickers bar, a bag of M&M’s, a pack of SunChips, and two bottles of Snapple lemonade. My youngest daughter has smuggled out the fancy snacks!
“Tember!” I say, holding up the Snickers.
She grins impishly and snatches the candy from my hand. “You said they were for us.”
On the ride home, the kids begin to emerge from the hazy fog of this hellish week. Their conversation grows livelier, and they begin to make jokes about which parts of the service Katie would have loved the most. Suddenly Bethany has a revelation.
“Hey, wait! Katie’s favorite baby name is now up for grabs! I shotgun ‘Jael’!”
I burst out laughing. With her typical irreverent humor, Bethany has not only laid claim on her sister’s favorite name for a daughter but also trailblazed new territory for us. Post-Katie territory. She demonstrates that it can still be okay for us to laugh, tease, and joke about Katie, who isn’t here to defend herself or tease back. This sort of irreverent humor is the Vaudrey way.
It is new territory for all of us. How will we choose to remember Katie in the future? Will we speak of her only in hushed and reverent tones? The laughter in the van—less than an hour after her memorial, no less—reassures me that we will not turn Katie into some sort of sterile, off-limits idol. For us, she will always be the same lively, impulsive, imperfect, delightful girl we knew and loved—and she will remain fair game for family teasing. She is a Vaudrey, after all, and she will remain so.
Bethany’s placing dibs on “Jael” unleashes everyone’s goofy remembrances of Katie’s quirks—her pretending not to notice (but still posing) whenever someone was taking her photo, her propensity for falling down the stairs, and how, after having lost a brand-new pair of knitting needles to airport security, she made it her mission to sneak harmless “contraband” past them whenever she flew. She kept a running tally and would text us from the gate: “Ha! Fingernail file! Katie, 4. TSA, 1.” We recall her habit of “accidentally” wriggling her way into family videos (her childhood refrain, “Are you filming me?” had long been a running joke). The kids tell tales of what a restless sleeper she was and recount the hazards of being the sibling who drew the short straw—and had to share a motel or motor home bed with her. And they vie for who should be awarded their middle sister’s favorite game pieces from The Settlers of Catan—the red ones—now that Katie won’t be there to snatch them up as soon as the box is opened.
By the time we arrive home, we are in good spirits, and the house and yard are overflowing with family and friends. As we step into the kitchen, the hearty aroma of Italian sausages, pasta, and marinara hits me. The meal is a gift from the parents of Katie’s friend Marie, whose family owns an Italian restaurant. It pays to have Italian friends! I breathe deeply and feel a familiar twinge in my belly: the pangs of hunger.
But first, I have a phone call to make.
I step onto the back deck. A few tufts of cottonwood drift across the cerulean June sky, and the songs of scarlet cardinals announce the coming of summer. I sit down on the stairs, pull out my cell phone, and dial my brother.
“Hiya, sis,” he says, recognizing my number on his caller ID. “Sorry about Katie.”
“Thanks, Greg. She loved you very much.”
“I know. She told me she loved me when I was Skyping her on Saturday. And I figured you’d want to know I said, ‘I love you’ back.”
“Yes, I did want to know, Greg. I’m glad you told me. Thank you.”
Has he been all alone during the funeral? How is he doing? I begin fishing for clues: “So, Greg, how was your morning? What have you been up to?”
“Not much, not much,” he says. “I had oatmeal and coffee for breakfast at 9:30, and then Wendy stopped by for a visit. She’s the new CNA.” Nicely done, Wendy.
“Hey, did your e-mail get hacked yesterday?” he asks, switching gears. “My friend David got his e-mail hacked. And I thought you’d want to know. I told him to report it. And I warned Dad. And Mom. Maybe you should warn the kids. You better check your e-mail because there is a hacker out there. Do you think I should change Internet providers?”
Ahhh . . . computer paranoia. One of Greg’s baseline topics of discussion. He never tires of talking about two things: computer security and his own aches and pains, which are many.
I exhale. My brother will be all right. He has already moved on. Perhaps this is one upside to his limited intellectual capacity. We talk about computer hackers for another few minutes, and then I say goodbye.
The kids and their friends have been streaming past me on the deck, their plates piled high with food. They sprawl on the grass under the hawthorn tree, talking and eating. Someone grabs a volleyball from the sports bin on the deck, and a crowd gathers on either side of the net on our back lawn. Katie would have loved today—warmth and sunshine, incredible food, and all her favorite people. She would be playing volleyball and talking and collapsing on the grass, laughing.
As I stand to head inside, an old friend of Scott’s from Spokane approaches me. “September, you know that image you shared in your eulogy—about God scooping Katie up before the car crash?” he says.
I cringe inside. Should I have shared that vision? It’s a little bizarre to sense that the God of the universe might be communicating to you in such a direct way—and only a weirdo would then tell an auditorium of people about it at her daughter’s funeral. I am that weirdo.
“When my wife and I got the phone call about Katie being in the hospital last Saturday,” he continues, “we were only told she was in a coma, but we didn’t know why. We hadn’t heard that it was a car wreck, and we knew nothing about the aneurysm until today. But when my wife prayed for Katie that day, she experienced the exact same image as you did—Katie’s car driving down a tree-lined road, with her body slumped over the wheel, unconscious, and God scooping her up, right before the crash. The image made no sense to my wife. Had Katie been in a car accident? If so, why would she be unconscious before the crash? But now it makes perfect sense. I can’t wait to call and tell her!”
Incredible! A woman I haven’t seen or spoken with in years, who had known nothing about the aneurysm—or even the car accident—had experienced the exact same vision as I had. I have no idea how such things work, but it seems like more than just a coincidence to me. I am more certain than ever that this image—or vision, or whatever it was—depicted what happened to my girl.
The house is filled with all the people I love most in the world, and I want to speak with each one. But my stomach growls. I grab a plate and serve myself a scoop of pasta, half an Italian sausage, and three strawberries. Then I find a seat alone and take a bite of the sausage. The oregano and fennel come alive in my mouth—delicious. I eat a strawberry. Not a hint of sawdust.
How the world had changed in seven days. It had been the most horrid-beautiful week of my life—a week of stunning contrasts. Never could I have imagined such pain. Nor could I have foreseen such beauty through these good and loving people. God had indeed provided the strength our family needed thus far. He had carried us through—i
n the arms of these people.
Tomorrow, our friends and family would begin heading home to resume their normal lives. And it hit me: Today was not the finish line. It was the starting line.
Tomorrow our new normal would begin.
Learn not to be afraid of pain. Grit your teeth and let it hurt. Don’t deny it, don’t be overwhelmed by it. It will not last forever.
HAROLD KUSHNER
Suffering will change us—but not necessarily for the better. We have to choose that.
WAYNE CORDEIRO
31
A FOG OF SHOCK AND NUMBNESS settled over me in the days following the funeral. Our entire world had been severed into “Before Katie” and “After Katie.” How does a family move forward after such a life-altering loss?
I’d heard of families who lost a child and never moved on. The one who died became the centerpiece of the family, and those left behind were mere afterthoughts. I worried I might be prone to do this to my family, and I was determined to not let this tragedy wreck my kids—or my marriage.
Perhaps these worries prompted the vivid dream I had just two nights after the funeral: I saw an aerial view of a rural homestead that had been devastated by a tornado. The house was ripped in two, the barn nearly flattened. A deep-brown scar cut its way through the rich sod of the surrounding fields of green wheat. But the family vegetable garden next to the house was untouched.
When I awoke, I sensed I knew the dream’s meaning. That homestead was our family, and that garden was my marriage. The message was this: As we began picking up our lives after this devastating tornado, first and foremost we must tend to that garden because it would provide the sustenance and strength needed for the rebuilding.
Friends and acquaintances alike had already been dropping well-intentioned little hints about the terrible divorce statistics for couples following the death of a child. I knew they were watching us, looking for chinks in our marital armor. I was not too worried—our marriage was a strong one, seasoned by all we had learned through our own struggles in years past. Our family knew how to do pain. We knew commitment and healing and forgiveness and God’s faithfulness. We had learned firsthand to say yes to pain; we knew the surest way through hardships was to face them head-on.
My guess was that many of the marriages from those daunting statistics crumbled because the partners felt the same kind of certainty I now sensed about Scott and me—a “surely not us” overconfidence that had contributed to their downfall. Surviving a blow like this would take intentionality. And skill. And a lot of grace.
So Scott and I took everyone’s worry seriously. We made a commitment to support each other fully as we navigated this uncharted territory. We reminded ourselves that our grief would not look the same, that even though we had both lost the same person—our daughter—our individual journeys toward healing would look vastly unique. (We are opposites in every other area of our lives; why would our grief be any different?) I needed to trust that Scott’s nonverbal way of processing didn’t necessarily mean he was suppressing or avoiding his grief. And he needed to let me talk about Katie’s death, even when it pained him. We made a deal to tend to what our own souls needed if we were really in the ditch and to tend to what the other’s soul needed when we were feeling strong enough to help—and when we were both in the ditch at the same time, to cling tightly to each other until the wave of grief passed. We prioritized those things that had always worked for us—time together alone, long conversations, and sex.
So I felt fairly confident our marriage could make it. What worried me more was my capacity as a mom. I desperately wanted to wipe away our kids’ pain, but I didn’t know how—or if—I could help. Just as Scott and I had differing needs in grief, so did each of our kids. The complexity of what we were facing as a family felt paralyzing.
I was also concerned that I would place too much focus on the child we had lost. She was ever present before my eyes. But I didn’t want to be a “centerpiecing” type of parent, nor did I want my other kids to feel they were somehow less important than Katie. How could I stay balanced—honoring and remembering my dead daughter, yet helping my living family move forward? How could I hold in one hand this devastating tornado, and in the other hand my family, our future, and our lives?
With no clue how to pull this off, but with an earnest desire to do so, I entered year one of our new normal.
32
NOT LONG BEFORE HER FATAL ACCIDENT, Katie had had a vivid dream, yet another in a series she had been having. She and I were making apricot jam together in the kitchen when she said, “Mom, I had another nightmare last night. Second one this week.”
“What about?”
“Both dreams were the same: I was lying on a long white table, and a man cut me from the top of my chest all the way down my belly. He opened me up and took out my organs. Creepy, right?”
I stopped chopping the apricots. “Ewww. Yes, creepy.”
“What does it mean?”
Dreams again—and such a graphic image. A few of Katie’s dreams over the years had held almost a prophetic element—images that made sense or events that had come to pass. Should I dig deeper? Or should I play the reassuring mom?
“I’m no expert on dreams, babe,” I said. “But often nightmares don’t mean anything—they’re just weird images that float through our minds while we sleep. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
With her dark dreams on the increase, Scott and I had suggested that she talk with a counselor about them. “Did you make an appointment with Andy yet?” I asked Katie.
“I called and left a message this morning, but I haven’t heard back. Maybe tonight.”
“I’d go ahead and set something up, and tell him about your dreams. He’s a sharp guy. Perhaps he can give you some insight. In the meantime, I wouldn’t let it worry you.”
She seemed satisfied, and our talk turned to her hopes for the future. But just nine days after this dream, Katie in fact had lain on top of a long white table, and a doctor had cut her open.
When one of your children has had premonitions of trauma, and then the unthinkable happens and that child actually dies, it’s hard to fight a panicky instinct to protect the rest of your kids at any cost. It envelops you. I am not a worrier by nature, but both Scott and I fought the urge to simply lock our remaining kids in a cage to be certain they would remain safe forever. Of course, this is both impossible and illogical (a cage would not have protected Katie). Also, it’s illegal in most states.
One night shortly after Katie died, Tember went to the movies with some girlfriends. Another mom was on deck to drive them, and Tember had her cell phone with her. What could be safer, right?
But when the unpredictable Midwest weather turned from sunny to dark and our village’s tornado siren blared, Scott and I freaked. I called Tember’s phone, but it was turned off (thank you, annoying movie theater ads about shutting off your cell so as not to disturb fellow moviegoers). I left quavering messages for her to call and let us know she was all right. For the next few hours as the impressive storm raged outside, Scott paced in our bedroom, repeatedly looking out our front window and checking for cars. I sat up in bed, motionless, staring at the clock, waiting for Tember to get home.
At last, around midnight, a minivan pulled into our drive, delivering Tember home safe and sound, despite the storm. I burst into tears.
The kids understood our obsessive protection over their safety that summer—but it still annoyed them. The compulsion to worry has calmed over the years but not disappeared. I suspect Scott and I will always have to work on managing our hairpin triggers.
With the funeral behind us and all the guests gone home, the frenetic pace of the past eight days came to a screeching halt. The silence was deafening. I wasn’t yet ready to feel as if Katie’s death were over. It was too soon.
So I busied myself with “death chores”—writing thank-you notes, throwing away the bouquets of dying flowers (the symbolism behind this chore did not escape me),
picking up Katie’s wallet and phone from the police station, getting copies of the accident report, settling matters with the auto insurance company, and poring through the first of the medical bills that showed up in our mailbox.
One death chore I wanted out of the way was picking up my daughter’s ashes. I stopped by Ahlgrim, where Karl the funeral director greeted me kindly and had me sign for a shiny, mahogany-colored wooden urn—sort of like a minicasket—that Scott had selected when he dropped off Katie’s clothing the week before the funeral.
“The lid is screwed on tightly,” Karl assured me, “and Katherine’s ashes are secured inside the urn in a can with a pop-off lid.”
A pop-top can inside an urn. These are the things you learn when your loved one dies. But I appreciated Karl’s explanation, as I had been worried that if I needed to slam on the brakes on my drive home, I might send Katie flying everywhere.
We didn’t yet know what we wanted to do with Katie’s ashes. We didn’t know whether to scatter them or bury them, and Scott and the kids were unified in not wanting the urn to go on display in the house. So when I got home, I wrapped the urn in Katie’s pink baby blanket and tucked it on a shelf in my closet.
For many months, no one asked what I had done with Katie’s ashes. Not even Scott. I liked the private coziness of having Katie all to myself, nearby, where I could take her urn and hold it close to my heart, unobserved.
And yes, I am aware that some might find this creepy. If I ever spotted a lady sitting inside her closet snuggling an urn that was swaddled in a pink baby blanket, I might have called the authorities. Never thought I’d be that lady!
One of the more pressing death chores was Katie’s car, which had been totaled in the crash and taken to a wrecking yard where it waited for someone to sign over the title and pay a hundred bucks for the towing. I handled this chore partly out of duty—but partly out of desire: I wanted to see if any of Katie’s personal effects were still in the car, and I just needed to see the vehicle for myself. She loved her Taurus, and it was the last place my daughter had been alive.
Colors of Goodbye Page 18