This morning I woke and as I lay in my bed, the first thing I did was turn over my pillow… to the cold side. I smiled to myself remembering that this was one of your favourite things in the world…. Ahhh, the cold side of a pillow. True, for me as well, though it was always an unspoken thing. Now, whenever I flip over my pillow I always think of you and the beauty of that small pleasure.
Hope the pillows in your new world are perfect… I’ll bet they are except for one thing… I wish you were sleeping in your bed here at home, your sweet head full of hair on your favourite pillow here… where it should be.
Love you little sun,
Momxo
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The color of your eyes and yes, the color of the sky on a beautiful sun-kissed day.
You are undeniably our little Mr Blue Sky but sometimes blue is used to describe feelings of sadness and these December days are quite blue for me, Willy. It’s not surprising at this time of year to harbour these feelings — we know this well, for every book on grief, every counsellor we spoke to and every parent walking with us on this journey will attest that that is true. Of course, it is. Missing a loved one over the holidays can certainly conjure up a dark blue cloud of sad that can sometimes, for some, make December unbearable.
For me, December feels like a magnifying glass pointed at the empty chair. Your absence is palpable, Will … sometimes it screams at me and try as I do to search for the silver lining sometimes there are days when I just have to succumb to these blue feelings and I retreat to a place within. I go quietly to that sacred place in my heart where the very best memories live, where you live and where I feel closest to you. I pray to God to help me through the darkness and ask him to watch over me as I sit there for a bit. Long enough to get lost in all those perfectly ordinary days that we shared but not too long that I would forget how to pull myself up. You know this place well, Willy… it’s where we learned to dance between what was and what is. My heart reminds me that grief and sadness are the price of love and that I am feeling blue because I love you and I miss you.
Sure, the hustle and bustle of December is here and…
I’ve yet to pull out the Christmas boxes, but I will.
I’ve yet to put up the tree, but I will.
I’ll bake little gingerbread boys, like I always do.
I’ll play Christmas music and sing out loud, like I always do.
I’ve yet to make my shopping list and venture out to the shops, but I will.
I’ll wrap gifts and plan our Christmas dinner, like I always do.
And, all the while I will miss you every second of every minute. Like I always do.
But, for today and maybe even tomorrow I will dance with you and not worry about the list. When it feels right I’ll be ready to return to the hustle and bustle of December feeling recharged and ready to go. You will urge me to go, reminding me that it is what you’d want me to do. With your gentle nudge I will get busy and “bring on” Christmas like we always do. I will trust that everything will get done to the best of my ability and that what will be this December, will be exactly what it should be. I will be present for those that are my world — Dad and Ben and Justin and Amy and Finn — knowing that together is the best place to be and knowing also that you’ll be smack dab in the middle of all of it. My beautiful family and my friends that feel like family will be close in my thoughts and I will let them all know how grateful I am for their love, their continued support and for their friendship. They really are the best gifts.
You are my blue crayon, Will, and I love you more than a blue sky day and a bus full of blue crayons.
Momxo
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As you well know, Mother’s Day holds a lot of bittersweet emotions for me. Being a mom to you and your brothers brought me the most joy and even still with Ben and Justin in their 30s, the second Sunday in May still just means so much. The nostalgia at remembering how lovely it felt to be surrounded by the three of you and celebrated on this day is something I will always treasure. It is the sweetest feeling to be called Mom and it will always be top of my list of who I am and who I still choose to be. At the end of my life if I could choose to be remembered for only one thing it would hands down be being a mom to you and your brothers. I loved being your mom, Will, and though I miss you in ways I cannot even put to words, you will forever be my son and I will forever be your mom.
I dream of the day when you and I meet again and though that place and that day feels other worldly and so far away right now, I know it will be my life’s biggest circle moment. I dream of it often.
I felt your warmth and your love yesterday and as the words, Happy Mother’s Day were spoken by Justin and Ben I heard your whisper in the little blue butterfly that I saw on my walk along the river path yesterday… I knew it was you.
In a week from now, and looming over me as I write to you is the undeniable lead-up to the hardest day of every of the last fifteen long weekends of May. Fifteen years. Fifteen years of no physical you, no bursts through the front door, no phone calls or texts or warm physical hugs. I will say, however, that I do still see you and hear you and feel you, and I thank God every single day that you live within me and that my imagination is as clear and as clever as you ever were. I got you, Willy. Forever.
I miss you sweet one. Forever my son, forever your mom, and forever loved on our forever big bus.
Momxo
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I cannot even put into words how to describe what this momentous passage of time, this significant marker, really feels like other than to tell you that you are still so sadly missed and immensely loved as much as ever. I imagine you are proudly touting your 10 year wings and I’ve no doubt they are bigger, brighter and sparklier than ever. Tonight I will look for you in the nighttime sky… pretty sure you will be the brightest little light up there tonight and before I retire to my bed I promise you I will find a reason to smile for you and because of you. This day feels heavier than usual for me but as I learned all those years ago deep grief is the price of deep love.
I miss you more than ever, sweet boy, and the big bus love is as real to me now as it was when you first said it to me when I tucked you into your bed when you were a toddler. The beautiful and cool thing is that the bus gets bigger and better with every passing hour, day, week, month and year and just when I think that bus cannot hold one more ounce of love it just does.
Ten years. Sigh…
Momxo
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Holding you close always and forever
Mothers Day, Sunday, May 12, 2013 (721 days)
Dear Will,
It’s not an easy day for me. I woke this morning and tried a couple of times to get out of bed, but I just couldn’t do it. I took the Kleenex box back to bed with me and stayed there all morning. I am trying to find happiness in remembering all the Mothers Day’s I had with you; the breakfasts in bed, the dinners you and your brothers and Dad prepared, the handmade gifts you made at school and the most beautiful handmade cards that I loved more than anything. I have saved them all. I considered them treasures always but now that I will never have another from you they are more precious than anything I own.
As I write you this letter I am sitting on a blanket beside the rock and your tree at Heaven’s Gate; the place where we lost you forever almost two years ago. It is both so very sad to be here but in some ways, comforting too. Memories of that day and the fun you were having here are as crystal clear as if it were yesterday and in the quiet times in between the birds chirping and a squirrel behind me in the forest chattering away I can hear your laugh and your voice. But, in the next breath as the tears trickle down my cheeks I, too, remember how it all came to an end and our world was changed forever.
Before I sat down I opened a bag of wildflower seeds that I brought along with me and sprinkled it all around the rocks and the base of your tree. In a month or two from now I am hopeful that I can sit here amongst the wild flowers; this spot already beautiful but a little closer to heaven I think with a mix of wildflowers shining their faces up towards the sun during the day and bowing their heads at night as if praying for another day to keep you company.
I am in no rush to leave this little place of heaven on earth. I will finish up the cup of tea that I also brought along before I pack up the blanket and my iPad and head back home. Dad and your brothers are going to put together dinner for me this evening. We will talk about and remember the Mother’s Days when you, too, were at the table with us. And we will all miss you so very, very much
Love you, little one. More than a bus.
Momxo
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My Pride. My Joy. My Boys.
Friday, March 21, 2014
Dear WillBilly,
On the eve of another “22nd day” of another month, of course you continue to be in my thoughts and like everyday I wish more than anything that you were here. Tomorrow afternoon is an important day for your big brother, as he will receive his iron ring in a ceremony where engineering students in their final year of university take part in what is known as The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer. It’s been almost five years since Justin began his university studies towards his dream of obtaining a degree in mechanical engineering and almost three of them have been without you here. You’d have been blown away, Will, by looking at the mind-boggling formulas and complexity of the assignments that he completed on a regular basis. I couldn’t make sense of any of them and wasn’t ever sure if I was even looking at them right side up. Justin would have been the best math tutor you could ever have and I wish I could have been witness to the two of you sitting at the kitchen table while he was helping you work through a math problem. As his little brother, you’d have enjoyed it and Justin would have too.
I imagined that this afternoon after school you and I would have driven to the city on a mission to find something nice for you to wear tomorrow. I wonder how tall you would be now and what size pants and shirt we’d have to buy? And would you still be trying to convince me that your Vans would be ok with your pants and that no one would be looking at your shoes anyway? I noticed myself pause and reflect as I typed that sentence, my head nodding up and down like you really did have a point. Oh, what I’d have given to be in the stores with you this afternoon doing what I wish we’d have had a chance to do.
Come tomorrow morning I already know that my heart will be heavier than usual; that it’ll ache a little more because you won’t physically be with us on this special day. Of course you’ll be with us in spirit; that I know with all my heart. You’ll be sitting proudly on my left shoulder where all the boy angels sit and you’ll be inside my heart where you always are. I already know that I will reach up and touch my left shoulder and that one or both of my hands will cup the heart necklace that is you. I don’t even know how many times I find myself holding that heart pendant in my hands. It happens frequently everyday. As Dad and I and Ben proudly watch Justin tomorrow afternoon we know you’ll be there too… in the middle, of course, where you loved to be.
Oh Willy. I will never understand why this tragedy happened to us. I will forever feel so robbed of watching you live your dreams and of enjoying the life you so deserved here with us. You, our youngest son and little brother to Justin and Ben will always be a part of our lives. That will never ever change, but oh what I would do to be able to see you, to touch you, to hug you.
I love you, little blue. Bigger than a bus. And more than the sky. I’ll be waiting and watching for the little wink I know you’ll send our way tomorrow while we watch Justin realize his dream of becoming an engineer and receive his much deserved iron ring.
Momxo
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Will’s Friends Ride For Will!
Wednesday, June 18, 2014
Dear Will,
On Saturday, your Third Annual Ride For Will was held here in the community that was (and still is) your home. It was a beautiful day sandwiched between two rainy ones and my fingers were crossed, hopeful that you’d help out by keeping the rain away…. In the back of my mind I was preparing for a ten minute down pour at some point during the event, your signature “gotcha!” way of wanting to always have the last word, and in the end I was thrilled that you waited until we were safe inside.
Three years and three rides have yielded almost $150,000 to your Foundation and I am still awestruck at what happens on this day each June that we call The Ride For Will. People, young and old, show up with smiles and pledges, with hugs and support, not only to benefit your Foundation, but to honor you and show their support for Dad and I and your brothers. It is a memorable and most beautiful bittersweet day that renews our hope that you will never be forgotten. To me, there is something timeless about a bike. The simple pleasure it provides and the freedom it symbolizes is a right of passage in our neck of the woods for each and every child that grows up in this community. I will always remember the excitement that precluded any bike ride into Bragg Creek for icecream or candy and when you and your friends could do it without an adult ride-a-long, quite frankly, you’d hit the big time. Now, Will, your friends are driving to the city in their cars instead of packing their pockets with loose change to buy candy and icecream and that alone is difficult to accept at times. The passing of time is indeed a tough pill to swallow and I am quite sure it always will be.
What is magical about your Ride is that your friends and people who didn’t have the chance to know you show up with their bikes, adorned with WillPower bands, and I Ride For Will stickers on their helmets and bikes. They ride and stop at the refreshment stations and fill up on free candy and freeze pops, pedal to the school and back passing all of the familiar landmarks that were second nature to you. When I see your buddies on their bikes they magically become twelve again and though you aren’t there, YOU ARE. I am hopeful that you will always be with them in some way. Whenever I see a boy on a bike, I am immediately thrown back into the many memories of you ripping out of the cul-de-sac with your pant leg tucked in your sock (if you weren’t wearing shorts!) in a hurry to meet a friend or two at the bike jumps or the soccer field or at a friend’s house to play. Those were the gifts of an ordinary day growing up here and memories that I will always treasure.
The Apres Ride BBQ and Silent Auction/Raffles that follow your Ride are amazing too. The love and support that shows up at our community Redwood House in burgers and icecream, in items donated for people to bid on and the lure of a raffle item is also magical. The entire day is beyond anything that I can describe and when I think back to three years ago how a few friends suggested and asked if they could organize a family bike ride for us in your memory I am overwhelmed at how it all started and how it has evolved and how it has continued…
It is no secret that you are in my thoughts every minute of every day, Will. My days begin and end with you and on Saturday, June 14th it was evident that you were on the minds of many who were there to support and remember and celebrate your life cut short. I know you were looking down on all of us with your big Willy smile and bluer than blue eyes. Since your tragic passing, it has always been our hope that something good could be born of something so tragic. There is healing for us knowing that in your memory what began as the simple pleasure of a bike ride has grown and taken on an identity of its own. The Annual Ride For Will allows us through your Foundation to make a difference in the world and that just feels right and feels good.
Now as I bask in the afterglow of Saturday’s Ride For YOU my heart feels a little lighter and oh, so full. You, little Blue, are quite a boy.
Love you like a bus on a bike, (and only you could make sense of that!)
Momxo
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