we often credit Linda to our ease with conceiving our first child. I just discovered I am expecting our third child. Looking at my dates, I think I may have conceived just shortly after she passed. With that info, I have a feeling the child is a girl.
I will keep you posted!! All the best to you. Blessings..
Thanks, Derek,
I don't think I'll ever forget meeting you just after my wife died. Sometimes I think its a prior commitment to soul growth. "The soul is less concerned with what's right or wrong and more concerned with what's nourishing." - Care of The Soul, Thomas Moore
Dear Derek, I found your site today for the first time. I believe in synchronicity and it was no accident that I read yours and Lin's journal and cried and cried for your loss and my loss. I was left feeling how wonderful is true human love and to experience that is the very reason we are on the earth. I thank you for your sharing of that love and intimacy of which I had almost lost hope that it truly existed. Please know that yours and Lin's experience is, for me, the pinnacle of human achievement and I am indebted to you for sharing that. Thank you
you don't know me nor my husband. We got to meet Linda very late: my husband Carlo was literally the last person she treated before leaving for the hospital. Thanks to this journal, we have been able to send love, thoughts, prayers during these months and feel close to you both on a daily basis. When I saw Linda the first time (she answered my phone call on a Saturday morning, something I'll never forget) I immediately felt a deep connection with her -- I don't know why. My thoughts are daily with you both. Thank you from the deepest of my soul for sharing your journal with us all.
I hope you are feeling the grass out under your feet (highly recommended in the early morning). I hope you look at the stars at night and feel all that love that truly shines from each heavenly body of light. Allow your tears to fall into the ocean and you heal us all. Grief is one of our greatest connections on the planet, it makes us all human, all needing of each other’s arms and love and poetry and song....across time, across space, across what it means to walk anywhere on this earth. Maybe that is how we discover that deep well of peace.
Green blessings from the green earth
Journal Entry Eight - June 10, 2007 by Derek
Dear friends,
It is a week since we held the celebration of life for Lin here in Sechelt at St. Hilda's. I'm a little embarrassed to tell you that initially I didn't want to have it, and then reluctantly agreed, believing that it would be for everyone else. Your stories, your laughter, your tears, your songs and your understanding of who Lin was and is, healed another part of my heart. I am so grateful for all those who came in body and in spirit to share in the love we have for Lin and for each other. It was heart-warming to reaiize you know the Lin that I know, the gentle soft healer, who never had an unkind word for anyone. A woman who also went to work, and even to a movie house with her pet love bird Dickie in her bra. Thank you for those memories.
In all of your cards, letters and emails you have made it clear that Lin and I sharing our journey with you not only helped you understand the loss, but reminded you of how love is the glue that holds us all together. Many of you asked that I continue this journal, as it has helped you through the grieving and to remember that simple phrase: "love the one you are with". So I will continue for a while for I'm sure that just like the memorial, this is also for my grief and healing.
I feel this urge sometimes to go so far inside with my grief that I don't want to come out. There is this warm sensation in my belly that drives me to go to the very depth of my memories and feelings. If I could just go deep enough into the emotions I will feel Lin still in her body. Paradoxically experiencing this pain of incredible loss feels safer than the outside world. For example, I called Lani the other day and said, "You know, sometimes when I am out driving around I think I just want to go home, close the door and drown my sorrows with alcohol. Then when I get home that all seems so ridiculous, especially since one glass of wine would do it. What is all that about, Lani?
She answered very simply, "Yes, when you are at home you feel Lin's love and support." Oh my how can I forget so easily that she is still here beside me and taking care of me.
Later that day as I looked at some more letters I found one that said, "A poem I cherished in my lonely times; may it comfort you in yours."
Don't surrender your loneliness
so quickly.
Let it cut more deep.
Let it ferment and season you
As few human
Or even divine ingredients can.
Something missing in my heart tonight
Has made my eyes soft,
My voice
So tender
My need of God
Absolutely Clear
- Hafiz
To add some more mystical charm I searched for information about Hafiz. This is what I found: Hafiz a Sufi poet, expressed in poetry love for the divine, and the intoxicating oneness of union with it. Hafiz, along with many Sufi masters, uses wine as the symbol for love. The intoxication that results from both is why it is such a fitting comparison.
Hmmm... I think I will have a glass of wine tonight and toast you all.
Peace,
Derek