I may be old and have lost much of my voice, but I still have something to say. For example, do you know that Sharon and I once lived in the Emerald City of Oz?
You can imagine what it was like to be a couple raised in Texas and living in the Midwest in a city surrounded by flat fields of corn when a strong wind of the Spirit landed our home in the technicolored land of Oz. Emerald City is, of course, located in the Pacific Northwest. Often on a rare sunny day in Oz, I could look out to snow covered peaks in both the north and south. Then I could Look to the west and see the Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains. It was always breathtaking. However, Emeral City has changed.
Shortly after we left, Oz was invaded by an army from the south that the locals called the “Californicators.” This was a greedy tribe of people who transformed Emerald City by buying up much of its real estate made up of small family homes and replacing them with 5 story high rises. These new households were made up of two professionals, mostly high-tech people. The zoning for parking at these new buildings is to provide one parking space for each unit even though the people almost always own two cars. The overflow fills all the local street parking. The last time I tried to visit my old church; I gave up after searching for an hour for a parking space.
The church I served evaporated during the scorched earth policies of TEC during the culture wars of the early two thousands. TEC forgot that in the US church is a voluntary society and if you don’t like what the denomination does and you don’t feel appreciated, you can always just leave. Recently, the old Church building was sold off to a developer to put up another high rise. I understand they got good money for it. Anyway, because of the conflict, it had long ago stopped being the church I had known.
However, we did return regularly to Emerald City because we had dear friends there. When we visited, we often stayed with one. Her name is Judy. She is everything that I love about Episcopal women leaders. She is smart, artistic, an enthusiastic reader, and a person with a quiet and deep spirituality. She was also a professional therapist and for us with two teenagers, she was literally a Godsent. She was my wife’s best friend and very dear to me.
About a month ago, I found Judy’s email address and realized that we hadn’t talked to her since Covid. I wrote and updated her on the monumental changes that have taken place in our lives in the last two years due to my wife’s medical condition. I ended up asking how she was doing. When I didn’t immediately hear back, I began to worry. Last night we received an answer from her son. It seems that about once a month he checks her emails and found my update. He shared that Judy now resides in Oregon near her daughter in a memory care facility for those suffering from late developing dementia.
Dementia is the plague of us Boomers. It seems that our bodies can now, thanks to modern medicine, live longer but often our memories cannot. Much of who we have been and are as souls is contained in those memories. Her memory loss is evidently short term like Sharon’s. My bride often can’t remember which day of the week it is, but for everything pre-covid, she is my long-term memory. Peter, Judy’s son, shared that his mother still remembers the names of her children and grandchildren. My experience is that the names of grandchildren are the last to be lost.
I close these reflections on friendship, memories, and Judy with two observations.
First, dementia takes away our loved ones one day at a time. There are worse things than death. This is especially true for us Christians who live in the hope of, well you know.
Second, when I read the lovely and caring email from Peter to my dear bride, we both cried. They were tears of sadness, joy, and thanksgiving. My experience is that grief often has a mixture of these. There is no doubt, however, that it is the price we pay for loving people.
When we experience grief and loss, it doesn’t help to seek closure, and we will not learn to get over it. Our memories that remain are what make us the people we are. They also prepare our souls for their eternal journey. We never move on from love. It too is eternal, and it goes with us even in our loss. We will carry Judy in our hearts for eternity.
