Tag Archives: Fernie

Robins and Brown Bunnies…

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Will's Memorial Rock - Fernie, BC

Will’s Memorial Rock – Fernie, BC

Sunday, April 17, 2016

 

Hey Willy,

 

Spring has sprung and with it comes all kinds of new “hellos” from you. The season of robins and brown bunnies, budding trees and tulips, open windows and shoes without socks, raking the grass of remnants of last fall after a winter season of snow and the excitement of putting out the patio furniture… its just gotta be Spring. But, wait… It can’t be spring until I have my picnic lunch with you and Dad up at your memorial rock in Fernie. Then it will be spring.

 

Last weekend your favourite mountain closed for the ski season and on the Friday, Dad and I had our picnic with you under a cloudless sky on the bluest of bluebird days. It was my first visit to the rock since last summer and a day I’d been longing for for some time. Because I’m not able to ski with my hurting knees, Dad made arrangements for one of the ski patrollers to give me a lift up to your magical place on a snowmobile. I believe there’s nothing that the Resort wouldn’t do for you and us; time and time again they’ve gone above and beyond any expectation we could have ever had and we are ever grateful. A “thank you” never seems enough.

 

Each time I meet someone affiliated with the Resort they seem to already know you and, well, it happened again. The patroller who gave me the lift told me that when he was training as a groomer three years ago he was taken to your rock late one night while in the snow cat. It was there that he learned your story and about your passion for skiing and for Fernie. He expressed how sorry he was to hear about your tragic passing and told me that you’re like a legend, Will; a little, blue-eyed legend. It’s not every day that someone gets to be remembered like that!

 

Dad and I sat with you at the base of your rock and had our lunch. We shared some quiet conversation and some “remember whens” and some silence too. During our silence I ran my fingers over the face of your rock feeling the etching of every letter of every word that we so carefully chose to have engraved on it. In my silence came flashbacks of happy times with you and then sadness for what will never be. And then a reminder of why we chose a memorial rock – a rock is forever, Will, and so are you.

Our family message engraved on the back

Our family message engraved on the back

Now it is spring and now I can focus on all the little hellos that you are sending my way; the robins and the brown bunnies, the budding trees and the tulips, open windows and shoes without socks…

 

I miss you, Willy, and I love you. Like a bus full of robins and brown bunnies and a big, beautiful forever rock.

 

Momxo

 

 

Thank God For Pockets

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Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Dear Will,
This summer has been full of thoughts and memories of you. Your little “signs” are abundant and when I think about them I can’t help but smile. It’s crazy how many heart shaped rocks I have found and collected this summer; my pockets bursting each time I arrive back home after a doggie walk with Finn or a bike ride to the river. On our vacation in Maui the heart shaped pieces of coral would, of course, find their way to the pockets of my beach tote and at the end of each day I’d add the coral hearts to the growing line down the middle of the table where we’d eat dinner by candlelight. Me and Dad and you. Wherever I was, it seemed I only had to look down and there were heart shaped signs of you at my feet.

Holy cow, Will, I’ve quite a collection and when I empty my bursting pockets I am reminded of the things I’d find in your pockets while sorting laundry. Oh boy, there were Little Lego people and magnets, quarters and loonies that you’d find between the couch cushions where dad would often snooze (“searching” the couch was your cash cow!). I’d find fuzz balls and bits of rolled plasticine, erasers and lint covered candy and the occasional bottle cap or a torn piece of scrap paper with a friend’s phone number written on it so you could call them for a play date. All the random little treasures that were important for you to keep at the time found a safe place in your pockets. Just like my rocks.

You, Kathleen and Kale on the beach in Montana

While in Montana I was reminded of the many trips you and Kathleen would make in the golf cart to the store for Laffy Taffy and the iced tea cans you and Kale were collecting one summer. All the sand hill adventures are etched in my mind too — when you and your friends would scurry up the sand hills, rest for a minute or 5 seconds and then run full tilt or barefoot ski back down the hill and into the lake.

Parker, You and Kale – Mud Monsters

All the fun you had with Kale and Parker covering yourselves from eyeball to toe with mud and clay, swimming, building driftwood forts and how during your last summer you’d fallen in love with playing volleyball on the beach with the big kids and adults. Some of those memories still bring me to tears.  

I’m back in Fernie now where there are memories of you all over the place. The ski hill, the ski shops that become bicycle shops in the summer, Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory where you had a preferred customer card from all the candy apples you bought (thanks to all the money you’d find in the couch?). Watching ski movies with Josh and how you loved to spend time with him and Andrea on and off your skis. I love it here, Will, because you loved this place.

Come next week I’ll return home to our Redwood home where summer memories of you will live forever . I am reluctant to look beyond next week as September 2nd would have been the beginning of your last year of high school. My heart cannot go there yet. For now I will summon and enjoy the many summer memories of you and reminisce in what was. I look forward to each and every little sign you send my way and will continue to fill my pockets with as much as I can. Thank God for pockets.

Love you, Willy. Like a bus full of pockets.

Momxo

The Gift of a Photo

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Friends Forever: Calvin and Will at age 5

Friends Forever: Calvin and Will at age 5

October 27, 2013

 

 

Dear Will,

 

Last night Dad and I went to the Lovenuik’s for dinner.   Your winter ski bud and summer beach bud, Calvin, was there too, choosing a night at home instead of a night out with his friends.  It was really great to see him, Will… though I wished more than anything that you were with us and that you and Calvin could have been hanging out together like it just should be.  I remembered when the two of you first met – at the daycare at the base of the ski hill in Fernie — ski buddies before you even knew how to walk.  The two of you, only 3 weeks apart in age, became great friends seeing each other every weekend during the winter months in Fernie for almost all of your “much too short” life.   Winters full of dinners and play dates, swimming at the aquatic centre and building snow forts on the Lovenuik’s front lawn until you boys were frozen or wet or it was time to go home to bed.  On many of those weekends, you and Calvin would go from building a snow fort outside to building a nest in the linen closet inside where the two of you would sleep.  I find myself both smiling and shaking my head as I write this, wondering how the heck that could have been comfortable.  Then, in the same breath, I remember that for boys, “fun” seems to always trump “comfortable”.

 

As the two of you grew not much changed.  Sure, your little one piece ski suits became trendy ski jackets and cool pants, your skis got longer, your feet grew bigger, and building snow forts turned into building ski jumps.  You no longer needed your dads to take you swimming for you were old enough to go on your own, the Disney DVDs disappeared replaced by endless hours of watching ski movies over and over and over.  Your friendship circle grew too, encompassing more boys your age, all of them members of the Fernie Freestyle Ski Team; boys that became part of a world that you loved so much.  Ski movies, stickers, ski mags, toques, posters, park passes and helmet cams became the norm.  What never changed though and what I believe would still be true was how much the two of you enjoyed each other’s company and how much your friendship meant to one another.

 

Seeing Calvin last night and how much he has grown is another bittersweet for me.  (You’d love his hair, Will!)  But, what I will never forget is what he gave to Dad and I after dinner.  He’d come from his bedroom with a photograph (the one above); a photo of the two of you when you guys were about 5.   Two little boys, hamming it up for the camera and as I looked at it my heart went back to that time and to that happy place.  This photo is a treasure; a gift so precious; a gift that’s worth can only truly be understood by a parent who has lost a child.  Sadly, there are no recent photos of you, the last one taken the day before the accident.  Photos of your 12½ years, though they will never be enough, are all we have now and each time I see one that I haven’t seen before my heart wants to take a picture of it so it will always be there.  I will always appreciate another photo, another story, another remembrance of you.  More memories for the memory box that will never be full enough.  Which makes me think… maybe I should put it out there to all who knew you to please share any photos of you that they may have.  All of them are treasures and memories that would mean the world to us.

 

It was nice to spend an evening with good friends and to see your friend, Calvin, too. I am ever grateful for the “gift of you” that he sent us home with.

 

Love you little blue.  Like a bus.

 

 

 

Momxo