Where She Left Off

The seasons blew through her like an ancient cosmic wind borne on the wings of the Spirit’s calm moving.

Anna felt urged to look back over her life in the days and months after her mother’s death. She contemplated the essence of her mother’s personality and its effect on her family. Deep truths came to her about herself and her interactions with her mother—as well as other people and events from her past. It was as if blinders had been removed, and she could see both the good and the bad that had intertwined to form the structure of her life. It seemed incredible how blind she had been.
Anna was an impressionist by nature. Her mind blurred events and conversations; she remembered exact details on one occasion and obscured them on another, always blending them into her own intrinsic perceptions over time. To label that trait as good or bad would have been a stretch, but on a scale of one to ten, she might have scored a ten for naivete—although she had learned a few things along the way.
The glory of fall was already overtaking summer in the mountains soon after Anna returned home from the trip that became the dividing line between having her mother near and never hearing her voice again or seeing her face light up when she walked into the room. Her mother had been her champion—her earthly advocate who was always on her side.
On chilly days when the sky was a deep Carolina blue and the mountains were turning yellow, orange, and red before her eyes, Anna pulled her sweater tight around her body and went walking in the hills. Even on gray, overcast days when, without warning, the wind blew its breath and shoved her along with its gusts, she walked. Dead leaves crackled under her feet, and others danced merrily in the breeze, tapping her face and getting caught in her hair on their way to the ground. Anna’s only companions along the familiar way were the faint chirps of crickets, which were now intermittent before becoming silent over the winter.
Anna was in her early fifties, and now that her children were grown, she had the freedom to spend much-needed time alone, delving more intensely into thoughts that mirrored the deep joys and cries of her soul. Feeling irresistibly drawn to ponder her mother’s ineffable presence and to reflect on her life, she was able to indulge her natural tendency toward introspection during her walks—as well as in her house alone.
The three years after her stepfather died had left her mother bereft, and there was no doubt it had been stressful. Anna had witnessed her mother decline into a confused and darkened mental state. In addition, Anna had been too far away to see her often. It would take her time to heal. The faithful woman who’d taken care of Eileen to the end had said to Anna, “You will have a tendency to look back with regrets. Don’t. I’m here to take care of your mother. You have your life, and this is my ministry.” Anna accepted what she said as a word from God. She knew she would have had the tendency to chastise herself for not doing everything she could have for her mother. Dear, sweet Shanelle had said the comforting words she needed to hear.
There are seasons in a person’s life as well as seasons in nature, Anna thought, watching geese fly overhead one day. By the end of winter, everything is dead—or dormant. For spring to come again, there must be rebirth. But what about people?
Her mother was dead. Anna had seen her in a glorious form after her death, but she was fully aware that her mother was alive and with her, just as she was aware that God was with her. She believed that God had given her a glimpse of her mother alive after her death and that, in some mysterious way, she would always be with her—similar to Him. She was convinced that God had bestowed Eileen’s continued presence to her as a gift.
Anna originally toyed with the idea that the gift of her mother’s presence might have been because her mother needed her—a far-fetched, arrogant assumption. But something else eventually occurred to her: She would always need her mother. Although they had been close, Anna had sensed a distance between them when Eileen was alive on earth. That barrier had been removed from her mother, but their relationship wouldn’t be complete until Anna passed out of earthly life and entered heaven with a pure heart of her own.
People, like animals and even butterflies, instinctively prepare to die, Anna thought one day. Unresolved secrets of the heart often need to be left behind before we pass from this earth. Perhaps the weight of them is too heavy for heaven. Sometimes a wounded heart holds unspoken truths long buried that are too painful to express until the soul seeks to be unburdened at the end. Perhaps this letting go is a preparation for our resurrection.
Eileen was a good example. One day, right before the debilitating stroke that almost took her life, Eileen seemed desperate to talk to Anna about a deep secret she had held on to for many years—and right before she died two years later, she made two confessions to the woman who faithfully sat with her. Alternating between a somewhat coherent state of mind and one of muddled confusion, she freed herself from chains that had encumbered her for many years.
Anna needed to walk and think, rock and reflect—and pray. She would have to navigate through the familiar waters of her past to reach the uncharted territory of her future. Impressions of sights, smells, and colors, as well as blurred images of reality, like shadows, drifted into her consciousness out of the deep recesses of the subliminal subconscious divide—and vivid flashbacks kept coming to her at random.