Healing After Loss

Reflections: Japanese Garden, Hermann Park

"Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it."

~Joan Didion: THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING

Healing After Loss

“You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.” Anne Lamott

(Please note: Kelly Kilmer just recently lost her dad. She had the Lamott post on her blog. Oh, boy, can I relate. It's been a year and a half since Mr. Dragon went on to the stars and I am learning to dance with a limp.)

Good Morning!

Healing After Loss

It's been eight months since Dick died.

When he died I thought time should stop.

There should be some recognition of the passing of this soul by the universe.

I used to say that I was married to a Boddhisattva.

He was kind, compassionate and generous without giving it a thought.

The universe should have at least hiccuped. 

"Make me to say, when all of my griefs are gone,

'Happy the heart that sighed for such a one.'"

~Samuel Daniel

Healing After Loss

Source: google.com via Snap on Pinterest

"There is a land of the living and a land of the dead 

and the bridge is love

the only survival the only meaning."

~Thornton Wilder

I found the Thornton Wilder quote first and was having a hard time picking a

photograph to pair it with.

Then I found the Pooh quote on Pinterest and knew this was what I was going to use.

I've always thought Pooh and the Pooh Crew where very good philosophers. 

Love does not cease with the event of death.

I still Love Mr. Dragon

and

He still Loves me. 

Wishing YOU well.

Healing After Loss

Postcard: Monet's Gardens at Giverny

I feel your presence

Together we made it bloom

Musashi's Garden

Musashi's Garden

A big thank you to our hostesses:

Beth for Postcard Friendship Friday

and

Rebecca for Haiku My Heart

Wishing YOU well and a joy filled weekend.

Healing After Loss

Ganesh - remover of obstacles

"The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, worry about the future, or anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly."

  ~The Buddha

Healing After Loss

"We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned,

so as to have the life that is waiting for us."

~E. M. Forster

Healing After Loss

"Don't cry because it's over.

Smile because it happened."

~Dr. Seuss

Healing After Loss

Mockingbird in the Japanese Garden



"You cannot prevent the bird of sorrow from flying over your head,
but you can prevent it from nesting in your hair."
~Chinese proverb

Healing After Loss

Japanese Garden Hermann Park

"I pray to the birds because I believe they will carry the messages of my heart upward.
I pray to them because I believe in their existence,
 the way their songs begin and end each day --
 the invocations and benedictions of Earth.
I pray to the birds because they remind me of what I love other than what I fear.
And at the end of my prayers, they teach me how to listen."

~Terry Tempest Williams

***

Several months ago I asked you to hold Roo and her Cowboy in your hearts.

Cowboy and Mr. Dragon fought the same horrible cancer.

Cowboy has gone on to the stars.

Healing After Loss

Buddha in Musashi's Garden

"I must learn to open bottles, move the furniture, open stuck windows,

go home alone, investigate the noise in the night, eat alone,

make decisions alone, handle money alone, go on trips alone,

fight with service companies alone, be sick alone, sleep alone,

sing alone."

~Sonja O'Sullivan

Good Morning!

Calla Blooming In Musashi's Garden

Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee.

~Job 12:8

Good Morning!

The first Gardenia bloom of the season in Musashi's Garden.

"Joy comes from simple and natural things, 

mists over meadows,

sunlight on leaves,

the path of the moon over water. 

Even rain and wind and stormy clouds bring joy,

just as knowing animals and flowers and where they live."

~Sigurd F. Olson

This quote, and others I'll be sharing off and on, 

is from the book

HEALING AFTER LOSS

Daily Meditations for Working Through Grief

by Martha Whitmore Hickman.

The book is a gift from a dear friend -- thank you Kim. 

Wishing you WELL and a JOY filled day.