The front door was open, and we heard a knock at the screen door. “Yoohoo,” a voice echoed into the house. “C’mon in,” my dad boomed. We’d been having friends and church family dropping off food for over a week now so an unexpected guest wasn’t a surprise. My friend Eva came in. “Dang! It smells good in here!” she said as she sat down.

“There’s plenty left,” my dad said. I put a plate in front of her, and as if it was the most natural thing in the world, she started to help herself. Grabbed some eggs and bacon and said, “Is there any more orange juice?” while I was bringing out the last of the cinnamon rolls. It was easy to be with Eva, a cheerful relief. We’d been friends since the 6th grade, and whenever either of us was back in Huntsville, we made a point of seeing each other.

She stayed maybe an hour, and as I walked her to her car, she handed me a book. It was called “Motherless Daughter”. “For some day,” she said. That was 30 years ago, and I still haven’t gotten past page three. Eva lost her mom when she was 12. I wasn’t ready to admit I was in her club now.

With the invention of Social Media, Eva and I have been able to stay in touch for over 30 years. She came to visit me up in Canada in the early 2000’s. I made sure she was fully indoctrinated in all things Southern Ontario like Niagara Falls and Tim Hortons (She still says “Rrrrrrroll up the Rrrrrrrrim to Win!” every time I see her).

When my first marriage fell apart, and I needed to “get my groove back”, Eva invited me to stay at her house in Jamaica. We spent a couple of days there, and then we went to an Airbnb by the ocean. Days were spent lying in the sun, swimming, and talking about past mistakes, present realities, and future hopes. Eva’s a social worker, so I’m sure she still has the bill somewhere for all the free therapy she gave me.

We have updated each other on all life events through Facebook messages, WhatsApp messages, and emails throughout the years. Her messages usually start with an old R&B song that she loved to sing to me: “Sarah, Sarah, what happened to you and iiiiiiiii.”

When she called in the spring to say she was getting married on July 4th in Alabama, I was thrilled. I’d planned to go and see my son Lex in Auburn the week before, so I’d be able to attend the wedding. We got to the venue early and were greeted with that warm Alabama air. The wedding was outside, in the shade, overlooking a pond. There was a host for the wedding, and before it started, he had us all standing up singing “Celebrate good times, C’mon!” while we all fanned ourselves like crazy.

I hadn’t seen Eva for a few years, and I don’t know what came over me. But when her 90 - year old father walked her down the aisle, I choked on my tears. I could barely breathe. Not only because she is stunning, but I was so happy she had found someone who loved her the way I do, the way everyone who knows Eva does. She gave me a dirty look as she passed me, as if to say: “Don’t you dare cry or I will too.”

Most of the attendees were Eva’s family and friends with only a sprinkling of Alex’s loved ones. Eva surprised Alex by having him hold a glass jar, and then she said to him something like “Now that we’re married, my family is your family and my friends are your friends, and whatever life throws at us, you can count on all these people to stand by you. I want you to feel the weight of this commitment.” And one by one, we took the glass pebbles that had been left on our chairs, and went and put them in Alex’s jar. When I got to the front, Eva and I made eye contact, and I let the tears flow. I cried over the fact that her mom wasn’t there. I cried over the fact that after 51 years, she had found someone who would love and respect her the way she deserved. I cried with joy that I had found love again, and that he was standing here beside me.

We didn’t stay late at the wedding. We had a long drive the next day, heading back home to Canada. I hugged Eva on my way out the door, with both of us making promises to be in touch soon. As we walked to the car, I turned to take one more look. I could see Eva’s head thrown back in laughter at something her brother Sean had said. I grabbed James’ hand and smiled, hoping that one day she’ll show up at our door, asking what we’re having for breakfast.

I think of my Dad daily. I have a lot of good memories of him, but oftentimes my mind drifts to the bad ones. I think he was much more frustrated with me as an adult than as a kid. I’m sure it was a nightmare for him to see his youngest child grow up to be a “bleeding heart liberal”. His favorite saying was “Good fences make good neighbors.” He believed that if you worked hard, you would never fall on hard times or be down on your luck. And he judged the heck out of people who couldn’t get their crap together. But then, sometimes, he would surprise me.

For example, I remember a young woman getting pregnant out of wedlock in my church. The church council wanted her to go to the front of the church on a Sunday morning and confess her sins. My dad told them that she’d been through enough shame and that he would leave the church if they forced her to do that. So Brave! I also remember my sister bringing a guy home in high school and my dad threatening to kick him out because he had an EARRING. You can understand my confusion.

Let me tell you a little story: In my senior year of high school, I played volleyball for a tough coach. She was a yeller and a name caller. She worked us like we were in the army. She was hard on us. And even though she brought us all the way to State, I wasn’t a fan.

One day after volleyball practice, my dad and I planned to meet at a shoe store. The soles on my volleyball shoes were garbage, and he was the one with the credit card. It was, as usual, a brutal practice. I got out of my car in the parking lot as he got out of his truck. “I f%#@ing hate her! She’s so mean! And she totally plays favorites! WORST COACH EVER!”

Now, this might not seem like a big deal, but I wasn’t even allowed to say the word “fart” in my house. We had to say “Break wind” or “pass gas” because “fart” was way too crude. So for my dad to stand silently while I lost my mind was unheard of. After I went on and on for a few minutes, I stopped. It was silent. Then he said, “Do you want me to talk to her?” and I yelled “Are you crazy? That’ll make it WAY WORSE!” and then I went on for a few more minutes before I broke down crying because what good is a huge rant if you can’t burst into tears at the end. My dad and I eventually went into the store, got the shoes, and he never mentioned it again. In that moment, I couldn’t pull myself together, and instead of judging me, he just listened.

After my dad died, I was texting with an old family friend and mentioned that I thought my dad was complicated. He wrote back that my dad wasn’t complicated at all, and that if I studied Norman Rockwell paintings, I would be able to understand my dad fully. Oh boy. God bless this man. He is 80, and I love him, but I had to take some deep breaths before I answered, “ How would you explain my dad’s conditional love then? Like, if we kids performed well, he showed love. If we didn’t, he showed anger. With all due respect, Mr. W, not everything is black and white.” His response stopped me in my tracks. “The way your dad was trying to handle the changing world was to surround or recreate the past, i.e., wagons, horses, cowboy boots, cowboy hats, and Wild Bill Hickok mustache. All of this was tempered by the fact that he was a Marine. He did love you, but he worried about the world’s influence on you and wanted to protect you from it. Every overreaction was done out of fear, but meant to be shown as love.”

I didn’t know my friend’s dad well, but I hope she knows she was loved. I hope he wasn’t complicated, and if he was, I hope she’s able to look past it and focus more on the love than the fear. And I hope occasionally she will come across a Rockwell painting and think of him.

In May, I spent a lot of time reading my old journal from my mom’s last week of life in 2000. Two things really stood out to me. The first thing is that my siblings and I survived the 2.5 years of my mom’s illness and still speak to one another and are still close. The second thing is how we lived in constant fear for 2.5 years, and how fear makes you do crazy things.

The last week of my mom’s life, we were sitting in the hospital waiting room while the doctors were trying to clear more infection out of my mom’s abdomen. I overheard my sister talking on the payphone to one of my aunts. She was talking about funeral arrangements. When she got off the phone, I snapped at her. “How dare you?! She’s not going to die, and you will feel so stupid for talking about her funeral! And I’m going to tell her what you said!” (youngest kid - what can I say) Amy was dumbstruck, as was my dad, but they kept quiet. When we were let into the ICU, I said I would go first (we were allowed one at a time). I got in there, and my mom was still asleep. I leaned down and whispered in her ear, “Amy’s already talking about your funeral with people. I can’t wait until you wake up and heal and live so I can say ‘I told you so’ to her!” (Denial - it ain’t just a river in Egypt.)

We had this wonderful ER doctor, Dr. Roberts, who had been with us night and day since mom had been back in the hospital. He checked in on us all the time, gave us his home phone number, and even brought in pictures that his kids had colored for mom because he had been praying for her with his family. The day before she died, I told him whatever he was doing wasn’t working, and it was time to try an oxygen chamber I had been reading about. Yes, you read that right. Me, a 25-year-old woman who got her degree in THEATER, was telling a highly trained doctor how he needed to do his job. His response? “Absolutely, I’ve actually been thinking the same thing. I’ll get the paperwork going, and we will put her in it on Monday.” After my mom passed the next day, I asked Dr. Roberts if he knew that she was that close to death. He said he did. “Then why did you let me go on and on about the Oxygen chamber?” He answered, “Because what you needed in that moment was hope, not reality. And I knew that I could give that to you.”

When we went to the funeral home to pick out her coffin, we chose a nice shiny blue one. And then the funeral director said we would have to order an extra-large one, and I was indignant. “I’m sorry, sir, my mom can fit in the regular size one, no problem.”

“The thing is, Ms Weber, your mom was a big woman, and those dang steroids made her even bigger.” At that moment, I could hear my mom’s voice in my ear, “Oh great, they’re puttin me in a double wide.”And then of course, all I could think about were “Yo mamma” jokes.

Yo mamma’s so fat, they put her in a coffin with a sign that said “Wide Load”.

As I turned the calendar from May to June, I felt like I was taking all these memories of my mom’s last week and putting them back in the box. I imagine an old jewelry box that is soft on the inside and has a bit of a grandma’s attic smell. I put the box back up on the shelf with other painful but necessary memories. And I’m relieved to be on the other side of May once again.

I saw it with my husband James’ Dad. He seemed to hang on until all his grandkids got home, some by air and some by land. All gathered around his bedside and expressed their love and admiration for him. He was gone within 48 hours.

I saw it with my own mother. She was hell-bent on being around for 2 things to happen: my brother Bob’s wedding on April 15 and my brand new nephew Alec’s baptism. I always understood why she wanted to be there for my brother’s wedding. For her, it was important to see her only son “taken care of” the way my sister and I were in our marriages. It was a bit of a mystery why the baptism was so important.

She was sick at Bob’s wedding, but she put on a brave face. It was hard for everyone who saw her. She was twice her normal size because of the steroids, and she was obviously uncomfortable. Her siblings told me later that they knew this would be the last time they saw her. They made the most of that weekend, having quiet moments over coffee and short walks in a nearby park. My parents had a suite with a couch at the hotel. I have a sweet memory of sitting on that couch with my mom lying in my lap, quietly visiting with my sister and dad. I massaged her head the way she had done mine a million times before.

As my mom got sicker and sicker, she kept asking my sister, “When is Alec’s baptism?” We knew there was no way she would be coming out of the hospital any time soon, so we decided to have a pastor come to her hospital room and baptize him there. And the only day it would work was on Mother’s Day.

I can’t remember what I had for lunch yesterday, but I remember every detail of that day in the hospital. I got up early, dressed warmly, since hospitals in Alabama in May are freezers, and went in. Mom was awake and smiled at me over the side of her bed.

“Hey girlfriend,” she said tiredly.

“Hey momma.”

Over the next few hours, people trickled in. My brother-in-law Steve’s parents happened to be visiting from Buffalo, so they came. Of course, my siblings and dad were there. Alec’s 5-year-old brother Tyer was there, running around. I remember hearing the door open, and our pastor friend, Mr. Hammond, and an elder from the church came in. My father and the elder, Mr. Scoggins, embraced. I had seen my dad hug another man maybe 3 times in my life, but my dad had known Mr. Scoggins for years and knew that his wife had died only a few months back. He knew what it was like to be in the trenches.

I don’t remember what Mr. Hammond said as he baptized Alec, but I remember hearing crying all around me. And then my mom slowly raised her arms to hold Alec, but sometime during the day, she had declined so much she forgot how to put her arms around him, she forgot how to hold a baby. I remember Steve holding Alec’s cheek against hers as my dad said through his tears, “We did it, Lena, we got Alec baptized.” That was a Sunday, and my mom died 6 days later on Saturday.

I think of Alec now, a grown man who is about to have a baby of his own. I wish I could tell my mom about who he has become. I wish I could tell her that that screaming infant turned into a kind and faithful young man, who is a true joy to be around and will make the best father. I like to think that Mom would have hung on for that event, too.

Bill: “Hey buddy, how’s it going?”

Neighbor: “Well, your cat’s dead”.

Bill: “WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY CAT’S DEAD? I just left!”

Neighbor: “Well, he climbed up on the roof, fell off, broke his neck, and died.”

Bill was really upset. “I can’t believe you’re telling me like this!”

Neighbor: “How did you want me to tell you?”

Bill: “I don’t know! I could have called the first day and you could have said ‘your cat’s on the roof and we can’t get him down.’ The second day I could have called and you could have said ‘we got him down but he broke his neck.’ And the third day, I could have called and you could have said “he died peacefully in his sleep.’ BUT NO! You just say ‘your cat’s DEAD!’ I am too upset to talk.” Bill slammed down the phone.

The next day, Bill called his neighbor back.

Bill: “Hey buddy, I’m sorry I freaked out yesterday, I just really loved that cat. But the sun is shining, the air is warm, and I’m feeling much better now. How are things there?”

Neighbor: “Well,(ahem), your mother’s on the roof and we can’t get her down.”

And that is how my mom told me she had cancer. It was November 23, 1997, and me and my mom and dad were at the Piggly Wiggly. My dad was inside getting milk.

Mom: Sara, I’m on the roof and can’t get down.

Me: ok

Mom: I have a mass

Me: I know...a massively large butt…

Mom: “It’s in my chest, in my lung.

There was silence.

I held my breath. I asked if it was cancer and quietly, she said yes.

I was 22 years old. From then on, my life would be divided into 2 parts. Before my mom had cancer, and after.

They had known for a week, my parents. I was in a local play and they didn’t want me to know until the show ended. They were so sneaky. They took the phone out of my room claiming that the one in the kitchen was broken (this was the days before cell phones). They also tried to keep me out of the house, just in case any doctors called. My dad asked me to go shopping at the mall, more than once. That really should have tipped me off.

You know I actually imagined as a child that if my mom died, I would sneak into the morgue and cut off her hand, just so I could hold it against my cheek every night before I went to bed. It was so soft and gentle, just that feeling against my cheek.

Do you know what I miss about my mom? I miss that we used to talk every day, even if I was at work.

I miss that she made every event special, like it was the biggest of your life.

I miss that she loved to sing spirituals loudly, especially when walking through major airports.

Whenever the calendar turns to May, I think of her. Not only because of Mother’s Day, or the blooming tulips that she loved, or the magnolia trees sprouting that she would stop to admire on walks, but on May 20, 2000, she took her last breath. We were all there by her side, one of the greatest gifts we could’v

e been given.

It has been 26 years now. Time has moved on. The tulips still come out. The magnolia trees are still stunning. And whenever my siblings or I hear that someone is sick, we call each other up and say “Guess who’s on the roof…”

The surgery took place 20 years ago, so I don’t remember a lot about it. But I remember we had to stay overnight, I remember that she couldn’t eat after midnight the day of her surgery which was tricky for a 2 year old, and I remember that she could eat all the popsicles she could handle after the surgery.

Her surgery didn’t take that long. They had me come back to the recovery room before she woke up. When I walked in and saw her with an IV taped to her arm, I said to the nurse “Uh-oh.”

“What?” said the nurse.

“I have a really strange request,” I said to the nurse. “ I need you to cut a piece of plastic tube and tape it to my arm.”

The nurse looked at me quizzically.

“Listen, I know my kid. She is going to lose her mind if she sees that IV sticking into her arm. BUT if she sees that I have one, she’ll think it’s normal. Trust me.”

So the nurse did what I asked. She found a piece of tube. She cut it and stuck one part up my sleeve and taped one part to my arm just above my wrist.

If you have never seen a child come out of surgery and wake up from anesthesia, it is pathetic. They are confused and disoriented and lost. Chloe wasn’t usually cuddly with me but she immediately reached for me when she woke up. I picked her up and put her on my lap. When she started sucking her thumb, she noticed the IV in her arm. I could see the panic on her face as she looked at me and looked at the IV and said “I don’t want that fing.” I said to her, “Listen, everyone has to have one of those. You have one, I have one. That guy in that bed has one. Everybody has one. It’s just the way it is.” She seemed to take the information in, then she settled into my chest and fell asleep.

When she woke up, she had a popsicle and we walked to the play room, dragging her IV pole behind us. She started playing with a big wooden puzzle. After about 10 minutes, a little boy came in. He too had an IV pole. She noticed it, then looked at me as if to say “I guess you were right, everyone has an IV.” Then they started playing together. That lasted a minute before Chloe picked up the massive puzzle and went to another table. At this point, Chloe was an only child and thought sharing was for losers.

After a restless sleep, the doctor came to check on Chloe. He said she looked good and was ready to go home. Then the nurse came in and removed her IV. She looked over at me and was like “Uh, do you want me to take yours out too?” Chloe was watching Dora the Explorer so I quickly yanked my tube off and threw it away. We got to go home within the hour.

My Chloe is all grown up now. Yesterday, she finished her last exam at Western University. In a few weeks, she will graduate with a Bachelor of Management and Organizational Studies. When she was figuring out what to do after high school, I know it was a tough decision. Chloe, like her mom, is not a school person. I said to her, “Listen, college is just something people like you and me have to get through. Our motto is ‘D’s get degrees’”. She looked around. She saw that others were going to college, getting degrees, and getting jobs. And so she resigned herself to do it. Luckily, no one had to hold her down and make her. My girl did it all on her own.

I realize it’s probably not fair to call it a “man” cold. I know that probably all over the world, there are men getting colds who get up and go to work and just handle it. James, my husband, is one of them. He just keeps on truckin’, no matter how sick he is. But then why are there all sorts of jokes, videos, and commercials about how poorly a man handles a cold? You’ll see a woman throwing up in a bucket, cleaning the kitchen, rewriting the Declaration of Independence, giving birth, and having a temperature of 106 and the husband is laying on the couch with some kleenex saying he doesn’t feel good. (Coincidentally, I’m just having a memory. The kids and I are living at the townhouse and I’m about to drive them to school. I’ve been up all night throwing up. I brush my teeth, make their breakfast, get them ready for school, and get them in the van. I throw the van in reverse and then quickly throw it back into park. “Be right back” I say to the kids and then walk across the driveway to the tiny park, throw up in the bushes, wipe my mouth on my sleeve, and hop back in the car and take them to school)

My father, God rest his soul, was the world’s biggest baby when it came to having a cold. He would be sitting in his lazy-boy chair, his handkerchief balled up under his chin, and a blanket pulled up as high as it would go. If you said something to him, he wouldn’t turn his whole head because that was too painful. Only his eyes would dart over to you with a pleading look, “Please don’t speak to me unless absolutely necessary.” Whenever my siblings and I would descend on his house with our families for a holiday, he would always get sick. ALWAYS. And the first thing he would do when we got home was not email us to say, “How was your trip? I hope you got home safely.” Nope, he would email and say, “Well, one of your kids got me sick. Been laid up all day. Could barely make myself canned chicken noodle soup.” Luckily, it became a huge joke between my siblings and me. Before we even went to his house, we would text each other, “Want to place bets on who’s going to make Dad sick this time?” I actually remember calling my dad after hearing his old Marine Corps buddy had died:

Him : Hello (deep voice)

Me: Hey Dad, it’s me.

Him: Amy?

Me: No, Sara (he always said my sister’s name first)

Him: Sara, hold on (coughing, blowing nose, etc) Sara (deep breath) I’m so sick.

Me: Sorry to hear that, Dad, Also sorry to hear about Alan.

Him: Yeah, tough loss. (pause) Any way, I’ve been in this chair for 2 days hacking my lungs up, my throat hurts so much, and my lips are cracked, no nose is red from blowing so much, I can’t sleep…

All this to say, the way I handle colds, I come by it honestly. I’ve been sick the last few days. I felt it coming on Wednesday night and I tried to be tough, I really did, but it didn’t work. The second it hits my sinuses, I know I’m in trouble. James, my husband, came in Thursday morning and said, “Are you going to work?” I mumbled “No, I’m sick.” He said, “You’re not sick” and I’ll have you know that I spent the last 3 days in bed, sick, just like I said I was.

Me: Ok, I’ll take Dave.

Him: No, I’m taking Dave. Why do you want Dave? He’s my best friend.

Me: Because, long term, he’s a good pick. Good listener, gracious, kind.

Him: Forget it.

Me: It’s my pick.

Him: Ok, I’ll trade you Danielle for Dave, plus I’ll throw in a case of beer.

Me: Deal.

In all seriousness, that’s probably one of the hardest parts of divorce, losing friends. Friends from the past know you, they know your stories, they know who you were. They have helped shape who you are. There’s all this shared experience, shared memories, shared lessons and then it feels like it’s over. It’s a pretty lonely feeling.

When James and I started dating, we would either hang out with his friends or with my friends. And it was great. It was fun for both of us to get to know the other person’s friends. But when the other group was reminiscing, it was always hard on the person who hadn’t been there. You can listen to the stories, laugh or lament on the stories, but if you weren’t there, that’s all there was…stories.

In the summer of 2016, I dragged James to a film at a local theatre. I knew the screenwriter/main actor because his kids and my kids had been in daycare together. When we got to the theatre, we recognized my son’s 2nd grade teacher in line at the concession. We said hello and introduced our significant others. It turned out that Marjolein, my son’s teacher, knew James because her kids had all gone to the high school that James’ worked at. A fun coincidence. We all took our seats, James and I in the middle of the theatre, Marjolein and Henry in the back.

To say this film was the worst thing I had ever seen is the understatement of the year. It was supposed to be a drama, but the longer the the main character waxed poetic to the heroine, the more I giggled. It was dumb, self indulgent, and ridiculous. Every 20 minutes in the movie, I would hear a burst a laughter from behind me, followed by a “Are you kidding Me?” I could tell Marjolein and Henry found it as painful as we did.

After the movie, as we were leaving, I heard someone yell across the parking lot “What did you think of the movie?” I was nervous to answer because I was worried that the screenwriter was in the audience. I said “Do you guys want to go somewhere and get a drink and talk about how GREAT that MOVIE was”? We met at Turtle Jacks and talked for hours, not only about the movie, but about our kids, our jobs, the fact that it was their 20th anniversary THAT DAY, and a million other things.

This August marks 10 years since we met Marjolein and Henry. Since then, we have travelled to Spain, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Mexico and countless places in Ontario together. We have played cards, ran from the police, dressed up as Prince groupies, and gone to our kid’s weddings together. We have laughed, cried, celebrated milestones, and mourned the loss of loved ones together. But most of all, we’ve been reminded, over and over, that out of loss comes rebirth. And that some of the best friendships can come later in life.

I, on the other hand, have lots of music memories. I can hear a song and immediately be transported back to a time and place.

“End of the Innocence” by Don Henley - I’m in the back of Brian Kimball’s car, John is in the passenger seat. We have just finished our last exam and are on our way to Pizza Hut for our last class lunch. I remember thinking how poignant the song was and then thinking I was a dork for thinking that.

“Don’t stop Believin” by Journey - The first cruise I ever went on. My brother-in-law Steve and I picked this song to sing at karaoke. He played the straight man (fitting). I was the wild one putting my heart and soul into it. The crowd (2 women in their 70’s) loved us.

“Against All Odds (Take a look at me now)” by Phil Collins - Italy, summer 2025

You might be thinking, “What an odd song to bring up memories of Italy” and yes, I can understand that. But hear me out.

Last summer, I went on a 3 - week European adventure. The first week was spent touring Italy with my son Lex and his friend Jordyn. The second week was spent at a villa in Tuscany with a group of friends. The third week was spent biking through Holland. On the night before my friends came to the villa, James and I walked to a nearby town to have dinner. It was almost cliched, it was so beautiful. The road was on a hill that overlooked a valley of vineyards. The restaurant was located in a building that was built in the late 1400’s, with huge gray stone walls and exposed wooden beams. All the food had fresh truffles on it. It was better than anything I could have imagined. On the walk back to the villa, I was teasing James about something and he playfully sped up his walking “How can you just walk away from me, when all I can do is watch you leave”, I sang meaningfully to his back. “When I stand here taking every breath, with you, ooo, oo”. Now I was in full concert mode, singing to the stars, the stray cats, anything that would listen. “You’re the only one, who really knew me at all - so take a look at me noooowwwwww”. James was walking twice as fast now, almost as if he was trying to get away from me. But that magical night and Phil Collins awoke something in me. Whenever we went out for dinner that week, the 5 of us would belt out that song, together, driving through windy roads on our way to fresh bread and burrata. “And you coming back to me, is against all odds, but it’s a chance I’ve got to taaaaake”. We didn’t stop there, we also threw in other Phil Collins Classics such as “You’ll be in my heart” and “Sussodio”. But something happened when we sang “Against all Odds”. It was like I was looking down at me and my husband and my friends driving around ITALY, for Pete’s sake, singing our hearts out and wondering if I had ever been this happy before or if I would ever be this happy again.

Music continues to stir up my memories. If I shuffle my playlist, I’ll hear anything from “Shoop” by Salt-n-Pepa to “Folsom Prison Blues” by Johnny Cash to “I am not my Own” by Jeremy Benjamin. And, while the music may be great, the power for me is that each song evokes some kind of reminiscence about a moment. The song takes me right back there - whether it’s happy or sad or in-between - and makes me think about the people I shared those moments with. I’m so grateful for the songs, and the memories.

The scene brought me back 32 years to a place that I rarely think about. When I was around 19 and lifeguarding at a local pool, someone came by asking if any lifeguards wanted to make a little extra money at a weekend camp for kids who had lost their parents. I don’t even think I heard what the camp was about when I shouted “I’ll do it!” All I had heard was “extra money”.

The camp was located on 20 acres with a lake where the kids could swim. There would be about 30 kids at this session, ranging from 4 to 10 years old. I knew that I would be a camp counsellor, staying in a cabin with some kids, but I assumed when it wasn’t swim time, I’d just be hanging out, working on my perpetual tan, eating candy. I was wrong.

At the welcome dinner, over ice cream, I was informed that I would be staying with the 4 and 5 year olds with another counselor named Belinda. Belinda was in her late 50’s; she had short grey hair and a wide smile. She asked me what brought me to the camp. I sheepishly said “money.” She smiled knowingly, “That will change by the end of the weekend.”

That night, after we got the kids settled and tucked in, Belinda and I went and sat on the front porch. She told me about losing her husband, Frank, to cancer 10 years ago. That is why she volunteered at the camp. “You don’t know heart pain until you have lost someone you love with all your being.” she said. And she was right, I wouldn’t know that for another 6 years.

Belinda and I had been outside for about 10 minutes when a little girl came out. “I can’t sleep, “ she said. Belinda smiled “I know what will help you sleep, what if Ms. Sara and I came in and sang to you?” The girl agreed and we went back in. Turns out, none of the girls were asleep and they were all in agreement to a concert. Belinda looked at me “What do you know?” I was about to answer when another girl said “Do you know ‘Part of your world’ from the Little Mermaid?” They had obviously picked the right gal because I happen to know ALL the Disney Princess songs. I began to sing softly, waiting for Belinda to join in. She did not. After the Little Mermaid and Sleeping Beauty, Belinda was snoring softly alongside me. That night, I sang for over an hour. Every time I tried to stop, someone would sit up and say “Do you know….” and another song would start. Finally all the girls, and Belinda, were asleep. I laid down on my bunk, wondering what the next 2 days would look like.

The remainder of the weekend was full of swimming, crafts, good food, and circle time. At circle time, the kids broke out in groups and were able to talk about the loved one they missed and what they missed most. Belinda and I sat in the back, cutting up construction paper for the next craft. “See that little boy over there?” she said as she pointed with her kids scissors. “ His name is Mark. He found his dad in the bathroom. He had shot himself. Mark was 6 when that happened. And you see that little girl, Maisy? She was in a car accident last year. Lost both her parents. Her aunt takes care of her now.” Story after story, Belinda filled me in with what these kids had been through. I was feeling so heavy and sad when, suddenly, the circle broke out in laughter. I looked up to see them all looking at a kid named Chris, who had brought a whoopie cushion and was showing them all how to make fart noises.

Right before the kids went home on Sunday, everyone gathered on the shore. There were several little sail boats sitting by the lake that the kids had made the day before. On each little boat, there was a note that they had written to their loved ones.

A poem was read, a song was sung, and then the kids went and found their boats and went down to the water’s edge and sent them off. No one said a word. I for one, couldn’t breathe. I was 19, life hadn’t hit me yet. I didn’t know how these kids were even standing, much less making crafts and fart noises.

I worked at the camp another 3 years after that, until my own mom got sick with cancer. Sometimes we had returning kids, sometimes it was the same ones. Every year, Belinda said we would sing together and every year, she would drift off to sleep. And every year, I would silently watch as the boats would float away, with goodbyes and dreams and love.

She usually called me at work sometime in the afternoon. I was a receptionist at a paper company, and apparently I had all the time in the world to take her calls. They would usually go like this:

Me: National Paper Goods, how can I help you?

Her: Hey, it’s mom

Me: Hey mom, how’s it going?

Her: Not bad…what’d you have for lunch?

Then I’d go on about what I had for lunch for a good five minutes. I have always believed that a work day can be infinitely better when you have a good lunch to look forward to. I must have had money back then because most days, I would go out to eat for lunch. I’d try the new sub shop down the road, or hit up the shawarma stand near the mall, or get tacos because of the taco Tuesday deal around the corner. Then I’d describe everything in detail. The crispness of the fried fish in the taco,or the perfect homemade sauce on the shawarma,. She would always say “My mouth is watering as you speak!” But, like I said, she was battling cancer then, so most of her lunches were soup or saltine crackers, whatever she was able to eat that day.

Sometimes my boss would walk out and I would immediately switch to “Yes, I’m sure we have those envelopes in stock. Let me see which one of our sales team is available.” And promptly put her on hold to deal with his nonsense.

When my mom passed, my dad picked up the tradition. Not as often and not as detailed, but he would ask what I had had for lunch. As he got older, his phone calls turned more into a monologue with him catching me up on all the church gossip (who was dead, who was getting married, who was buying a new tractor - rural Tennessee - what can I say) When he was done talking, he’d say “Well, that’s all I’ve got here”. One of our last phone calls, I could tell he wasn’t feeling good but also knew he didn’t want to get off the phone. “Want to know what I had for lunch?” I said, hopefully. “Sure” he sighed.

My son now lives 1000 miles from me. He has been gone for 6 months, and I still try not to take it personally. We text often, mostly about the dog and what he’s been up to (the dog that is). Sometimes I take pictures of kids skating in our local park or a quiet snow fall in the late evening, hoping it will lure him back home at the end of all his shenanigans (University) Today I asked how work was. He said “Good.Busy.You?” I replied that I had had a good day, that I worked from home and had the Canada vs. Czechia hockey game on in the background while I worked on a mountain of invoices. There was a few minute pause before I got his next text “What’d you have for lunch?” I’d like to say that I responded like a normal person and that I didn’t burst into tears, but I did. Man, I miss my kid. And I guess I miss my parents too. But more than that, I’m reminded that it isn’t the deep conversations that we miss the most. It’s the every day connection that you think is so normal, until one day, it’s not.

She bought loads of snacks for me and my friends. She came to see the play I was in - for the third time. We invited the cast back to our 2 bedroom apartment to hang out after the performance. I can still see her sitting on the floor of the living room (what was wrong with my friends for not giving my poor mamma a chair?!?!). I don’t remember if she said much, but I know she was happy to be there. You always want to see your kids happy. I remember that night going outside with her while she had a smoke (I grew up so embarrassed that my mom smoked. Maybe, if I had grown up in a Dutch community, it wouldn’t have been a big deal. But in the south, it felt like she was sacrificing pigs to the gods nightly in our front yard). We sat on the front stoop of my apartment building, looking at the stars. It was a warm night for April in Ontario. I remember feeling relaxed, which has never been my go-to feeling.

Two weeks ago, I loaded up our ancient cot, a sleeping bag, and my dog Karl and drove to spend the night at my daughter Chloe’s apartment. She goes to Western University in London, Ontario, and is in her last year. If the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, she will graduate in May. I don’t know who will be happier, her or me.

This was the first time I was staying overnight with her - and kind of the first opportunity I’ve had. In her first year, she lived in a dorm. Her second year, she was in an apartment where I didn’t really know the girls. The third year, she lived in a crowded house with a couple of exchange students - so there would have been no place to sleep. But now she is living in a spacious two bedroom apartment with a lovely roommate, and I get to work from home on Wednesdays. So, I drove up on a Tuesday night with the intention of sleeping over and working from her apartment the next day.

Have you ever had a random evening that is so uneventful but one of the best nights of your life? That evening, we ordered in dinner, we looked at a bunch of old pictures I had brought in a shoebox, we laughed and talked with her roommate, and we walked Karl through huge snow drifts, occasionally having to stop to make tik-toks. Chloe knows her mamma is old and can’t stay up late, so around 11 she let me crawl into my cot in the living room with Karl on his bed beside me. She tucked us both in and said over and over how grateful she was. She turned out the lights and went to bed.

The cot has a dip in the center so you feel like you are sleeping in a cocoon. I reached down to pet Karl. It dawned on me that I am the same age that my mom was when she slept over in my first apartment. I could see the stars through the slit in the curtain hanging over the window, winking at me. It was as if they knew too.

I’m not a big fan of New Year’s Eve. I feel like there’s too much pressure to make it something BIG, something memorable. Maybe when I was younger, like in high school, I liked NYE. Maybe because I KNEW we would be going to my best friend Jeff Russell’s house, I KNEW we would be dancing to Paula Abdul in his upstairs great room. I KNEW there would be chips and Mountain Dew.

But now, it seems like a chore. I won’t tell you my age, but I will tell you I was alive when Elvis Presley was alive. And staying up late reminds me that I’ll be tired for the next few days (who am I kidding, I’m always tired. These influencers who say “Do this, and you will wake up refreshed!” When was the last time a parent woke up refreshed? Probably before they had kids).

The earliest I ever went to bed on NYE was 2004. My daughter was 6 weeks old and I was down in Tennessee with my family for the holidays. I remember laying on my dad’s bed with my husband and my sister, dozing off at 7 pm, with my nephew Tyler jumping around saying “You gotta stay awake until midnight - it’s NEW YEAR’s EVE!” I think I made it until 7:40 before calling it a night.

Don’t get me wrong, this last NYE was fun. We went to our friend’s house. There were 6 of us. We ate good food. We had good conversation. We played lots of games. Around 10:45, I thought “Well that was fun. I’m ready to go home.” But no, it’s New Years Eve! You aren’t allowed to go home before midnight. Ironically we started another game and realized with 10 seconds left that the ball was about to drop. We left at 12:10.

Two years ago, I was on a cruise at New Years. My sister and I got all gussied up. We went out for a fancy dinner. Around 10, I pulled an Irish goodbye and went to bed. I just couldn’t muster up the energy to stay up ANOTHER 2 hours. BUT the next night was 80’s dance night. I was out until 2:30 AM. I need to pick my times to be energetic and all in.

What if we all decide, together, that NYE isn’t that big of a deal? Or that it’s a big deal, just one that ends at 10? I think if we collectively decide this, no one will feel left out. Am I the only one feeling this way? What are your feelings on the pressures of NYE?

Dear Aunt Fran,

Thank you for taking me out to lunch yesterday, even though my birthday was a month ago. You wouldn’t let my 50th sail by without some kind of celebration. I think that is a Hamstra quality. My mom, your big sister, always made birthdays a big deal. There was always streamers and cake, and a favorite dinner. I bet you did the same thing for your kids.

We met at a Mexican restaurant in downtown Hamilton. My choice, but I didn’t think about how parking was going to be a nightmare. You drove around for 30 minutes looking for parking. You called me to say where you were and ask which way was the restaurant; but, unfortunately, I don’t know north, south, east, or west - so I said something like: “Walk toward the busy street.” Lame, but you made it there with a smile on your face. We ate nachos and enchiladas, looked at pictures, and reminisced. I love that we can laugh through our shared grief and can joke irreverently while talking about previous funeral planning. When two hours were up and I had to head out, We still had at least 3 items on our agenda to talk about.

We have always been close, Aunt Fran. My family would drive up here from Alabama every new Year’s to spend time with your family. You and my mom were close, and your daughters are like sisters to me. Those New Year’s Eve’s would be filled with games and good food and laughter. We would watch “Dick Clark’s Rockin’ Eve” all piled in your parent’s living room. We got to stay up until the ball dropped. I feel like I remember noise makers on the porch, but I may be making that up.

In 1992, Mom and I came up here to visit you and your family, as well as visit a local college. While there, I had a severe reaction to a medication I was on which caused all the blood vessels in my feet to burst. I ended up in the local hospital. The first thing they tested me for was leukemia. My mother snapped at me: “You’re ruining our vacation!” But you sat by my bed and held my hand and pushed my hair off my forehead and told me funny stories about when I was a child (In my mom’s defense, she would turn fear to anger. I know where I get it from)

You said I was a performer from the start. At 3 years old, you said I would walk around singing my address “222 Nancy Road, Madison, Alabama, 3575888888888!” It’s a wonder I didn’t get kidnapped.

You also reminded me of the time we visited when you lived in Quebec. We were walking home from church on Christmas Eve, and I saw Santa go into some house and took off after him. I ran into this stranger’s house and stopped dead in my tracks. I was so confused because Santa was speaking French and the Santa in Alabama always spoke English, albeit with a heavy drawl.

You came to see my mom a lot when she was sick, Aunt Fran. She wasn’t very patient with you, or any of us for that matter, but you loved her anyway and were so patient. You were always concerned about my well-being, even while you and your siblings were so broken from losing your sister.

You have always been incredibly generous over the years. You have supported my acting career from day one, and were always one of the first ones to comment on my Substack essays,

We have laughed and cried together. We have looked at over a million pictures together. We have gone on countless Thanksgiving hikes together - some long, some only 5 minutes before we plopped down on a blanket and busted open the wine.

I’m not sure, but I think it’s rare to be so close to your mother’s siblings. I know I have lucked out in that department. Not just with you, Aunt Fran, but with Dot, Hank, Shirley, and Agnes as well.

I hope to be like you when I’m your age, Aunt Fran. I hope I cross-country ski and hike like you. I hope I’m hospitable to known and unknown like you are. I hope I keep the faith like you. I hope I collect photos like you. But most of all, I hope my niece feels as loved and cherished by me as I do by you.

Love,

Sara

There are many reasons why I’m happy to be married to my husband, James, but probably his benefits are in the top five. I get 6 free massages every year through his benefits, and you better believe I’m going to use every one of them.

I have a love-hate relationship with massages (such a first-world problem) The second I lay down on the table, I know that the massage therapist is going to try to fix things. They wanna fix the kink in my neck. They wanna work on the scar tissue in my back. They want to work my calves. They ask if I sit all day. I say, “I do.” They say they can tell. But then I say I am only there to relax. Because if I was going to let them fix things, it would take 24 hours, and not just the one hour we have together.

So, I always have to be very clear. “Hey, hi there, I just want to relax. That is all.” Then they start massaging and they inevitably go too deep. I remind them, “I just wanna relax, you are going to have to lighten up a bit.” I am sure they are bored. I am sure they are thinking “Why couldn’t I have somebody with a rotator cuff issue that I could work on?” Well maybe next time friend, but I am just here to relax. Finally, around the 20 minute mark, my body starts to release and I actually start to relax.

But then the next thing I fight is the music. The massage clinic I go to plays modern music but is made into classical music. When I say it’s tricky for me to relax to “Turn around, bright eyes,” I mean this from the bottom of my heart. I once choreographed that whole song in a pool in the Dominican Republic after a couple of margaritas. I’m not saying it was my best work, but it was pretty dang good. So I’m laying there, and the moves come back like it was yesterday. “Turn around bright eyes” and everything in my being wants to turn around on the bed. And when Richard Marx starts singing that he will be right here waiting for me, I know he wants me to sing along with him at the top of my lungs. Because I went to that concert in 1992 and I know he was singing directly at me.

Of course, the next song is the classical version of “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey, which is my go-to karaoke song; so it is extremely tricky not to start singing about a small town girl, living in a lonely world. The only thing missing in that scenario is my brother-in-law Steve, who is my karaoke partner in crime.

Once I get past all the songs I know and all the songs I need to belt out or dance to, I go back to deep breathing and relaxation mode. But then I really start to panic. Is the massage almost over? I’ve lost track of time. Is it 10 minutes left or 30? I don’t know and I’m worried that it’s going to end soon when I’m just starting to enjoy it.

My favourite part is when I lay on my back and they dig into my neck, shoulders and head. There is no better feeling. All the tension I’ve been carrying from the timing, the music, my need to sing and dance, and the massage therapist going too deep has slipped away. I’m totally in the zone, about to fall asleep. “Ok, all done!” says the massage therapist. I’m mad at myself for not enjoying it more. I get up slowly, put on my clothes, drink some water, and immediately go out to book my next one.

She had been battling lung/brain cancer for 2 years by this point but was in good spirits when I walked in the door on December 14. That day, we watched Christmas movies, drank the good coffee, ate the good snacks, and caught up. Insomnia was one of the side effects from some medications she was on so that first night, around 2 am, I heard my bedroom door creak open and a soft voice say “Want to play cribbage?” We met at the table and played cribbage for hours and right before I went back to sleep, she said “Sara, I think it’s back.”

My mom always knew when something was wrong with her body so we made an appointment to have a CT scan at 5 am the next day. We were called into the oncologist’s office by 2 pm. “I’m sorry to tell you this Mrs. Weber, but you have 6 new brain tumors and I’m afraid we can’t operate this time. We'd like to try a new procedure called a gamma knife in the new year.” My mom turned to me and said “We are not telling your brother and sister this news until after Christmas.”

We drove about 4 hours to my sister’s house on Christmas Eve. It was tense. My sister was pregnant and tired. My mother was scared and snippy. And hanging over all of us was this impending doom-filled announcement.

After our Christmas Eve buffet, we all piled into the den to open presents. My dad bought my mom a diamond engagement ring. He was about 28 years late, but she didn’t seem to mind. Then my mom wanted to sing some Christmas carols, man, she loved singing Christmas carols. We sang some traditional ones, Silent Night and O Holy Night, then she started quietly singing a Dutch Christmas song “Ere Zijn God”, which means “Glory to God.” I assumed none of us knew the words so was surprised when my then-husband Shane joined in. The Christmas lights twinkled, wrapping paper was strewn around the room, and all you could hear was the sound of a woman and her son-in-law, quietly singing in her native tongue. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

The day after Christmas we piled in 2 cars to all go to Gulf Shores for a few days. I told my sister the news in our car, my mom told my brother the news in their car. We made the best of our time at the beach with good food and sunshine, late-night cribbage games, and walks in the sand. But we all knew the inevitable - this would be our last Christmas all together.

Last Saturday night, we went with some friends to a show called “Choir!Choir!Choir!” Fifteen years ago, these 2 guys put together a show where the audience joined them in singing songs. They have done an Abba show and a Queen show. It is wildly popular. The show we went to was called “Unsilent Night” and it was all Christmas, all the time. They taught us harmonies to some of the great Christmas songs like “Walking in a Winter Wonderland” and “Silent Night” We were told to call someone we love and sing White Christmas with them. I called my sister. And then one of the guys asked the audience if we knew Oh Holy Night. We all started singing it and when we sang “Fall on your knees, oh hear the angels’ voices,” I had to swallow hard. I was immediately transported back to that last Christmas with my mom, singing that song. I thought of her hand in my hand. I thought of the twinkly lights and how much she loved to sit by the Christmas tree. I thought of how closely joy and grief often sit in my heart.

At the end of the night, we sang “What a Wonderful World.” The leaders encouraged us to reach out to the people beside us. And it didn’t feel strange at all. I hugged my friend Stephen and James hugged the stranger to his left. We were in the balcony so I could watch people crossing the aisles and sharing laughs, hugs, and high fives. I thought about singing Christmas carols and what it does to people, what it did to my family. How it brings people together in love and harmony, even when stress, fear, and anger want to have us do otherwise. How singing makes us want to kick hate to the curb and reach out and hug a stranger. “A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices.” Yes, yes it does.

Merry Christmas everyone. I hope this season finds you singing your heart out.

My son Lex started basketball late in the game, because he had been so focused on hockey since before he could walk. We used to live across the street from a park where Lex and I would go shoot hoops, play horse, and play 21. He would get so mad at me because: A. I’m amazing at basketball and B. He was half my height which made me even better. But he developed this beautiful shot from just outside the 3 point line. And he started growing tall like all good Dutch boys do.

So a few years ago, he tried out for his high school team, and he made it. He didn’t get a lot of playing time but when he did, he would inevitably make that shot. Then he joined a Saturday league where he could practice that shot more and more. The Saturday league allowed him time to learn how to pass and dribble. It also taught him how to be a team player.

I have loved watching him develop these skills over these past four years. Partially because it’s like ballet when players move where they’re supposed to and when a bounce pass hits just right. And partly because it brings me back to my old days of basketball.

I started playing basketball in sixth grade, under one of the best coaches ever, Mr. Shows. He was patient - but man, did he know the game. If you have ever seen 6th grade girls play basketball, it is like a herd of buffalo moving together as fast as they can, knocking into each other, falling over, and doing it all again on the other end of the court. I can still hear my dad yelling from the stands “Let’s go, Ladybugs!” and I can still feel me shaking my head in his direction “Geez dad, we’re the HORNETS, not the ladybugs! Read the shirts!”

I started out as a cheerleader in grade seven, but realized the drama was not for me; so, I moved back over to basketball in the eighth grade (when I watched that documentary about the Dallas cowboy cheerleaders, I thought “Dang, I could have done this if I just STUCK with it”). But I had a knack for basketball. I, too, had a good shot. But, for me, it was just inside the 3 point line. And I hit it more times than I didn’t. If you have never seen high school girl’s basketball, it’s basically: one girl does an air ball, is embarrassed, so runs down the court and fouls the other team to make herself feel better.

I remember one Friday night game in our home gym. The game was tied with 10 seconds left, the stands were packed, the cheerleaders going nuts. Mr. Madison, another great basketball coach (and my trigonometry teacher), called a time out. He set up a play that didn’t include me, but made sense. The ref blew the whistle and we took our places. The ball was thrown in to our best player, Patsy, and she must have got amnesia because she threw it to me. I turned and shot my shot. It went in. The crowd went wild. The best part is that we were playing a tiny school who recorded their games over the radio every Friday night. So, after the game the announcer gave me a cassette tape to listen to: “Adams throws the ball to Powers, Powers passes off to Weber, She Shoots and SCORES! WCA WINS BY 2!” And then it is just pandamonium. I still have the cassette somewhere.

I watched Lex play last Thursday. Because he is one of tallest on the team (around 6’2, but he likes to tell the ladies 6’7), they have moved him to power forward. That is tough on him because he doesn’t have much room to shoot. When he boxes out another kid in defense, my body tenses as if I am boxing out a kid. When he jumps for the rebound, I find myself almost jumping out of my seat. When he is pushed to the ground, I go between feeling the pain and holding back my mama rage. The game was super close. There were a couple of minutes left when Lex found himself in his perfect shooting spot. Someone passed him the ball, and he was wide open. He took the shot, and it was all net. I stood up and let out a scream that made most of the spectators turn around and look at me. I didn’t care. I was so proud.

In this advent season, I wish you the kind of joy that makes you so happy you stand, yell, ignore who’s looking at you, and get it all on tape.

But we did it. We survived that first Christmas. And, as much as people had said to me that 2016 stunk (because of job loss, family strife, politics), it was so much better for me than 2015 that I hadn’t really noticed the “stink” and had just noticed, more and more, the sun shining and delicious foods and laughter and amazing friends. And because of all this new found joy, I told my kids that the first Sunday of Advent, Dec. 4, 2016, the 3 of us were going back to the farm and cutting down a tree. The kids were elated. Me? A little nervous about how it would all go. If you’re a single mom who used to be a married mom, things were WAY EASIER when you had a strapping, strong partner to help cut down trees (it sounds like I was married to Gaston), but if you are also a single mom, you know how important it is to prove to yourself (AND EVERYONE ELSE) that you can cut down your own DAMN tree, thank you very much. So away we went.

Southern Ontario is really odd as far as weather goes, but it felt like God was smiling down on us that day by giving us some great Christmas weather. We took that wagon ride into the forest, hopped off, and started walking through the trees. We hemmed and hawed over several trees and then found the perfect one. THE PERFECT ONE. Tall, full, everything we dreamed of. I took out the saw I borrowed at the farm and started cutting. I knew it would be hard, but holy Moses, I barely made a dent. I worked and worked on my hands and knees trying to cut down this monstrosity. I would saw for 2 minutes, pause for 2 minutes, saw for 2 minutes, pause for 2 minutes. My back ached. My knees throbbed. My arms were turning to rubber. The kids were mostly encouraging, save for one comment by my son “Dad would have had this tree down a looooong time ago”. I know that kid, don’t I know that. After about 20 minutes I prayed. “God, seriously?? Please, please help me! I’m doing my freaking best here.” (I’ve never claimed to be eloquent in my prayers). Not 30 seconds later a man walked by and said nonchalantly, “Need a hand?” And what I thought was “NO, I’m a tough, independent woman and I can do everything on my own and better than ANY MAN for pete’s sake!” but what I said was a quiet “Yes, please.” He cut down the tree in 90 seconds and I felt kind of deflated, disappointed that I can’t do everything on my own, that I’m not the “Single mom extraordinaire” that I thought I was.

As we carried the tree back to our car, I remembered the church service that morning. It was about hope. And not the kind of hope like “I hope I win the lottery.” But the kind of hope that says “I hope that someone will come along and help me.” And then it happens. And it’s small, and he probably just had a better saw than me, and I haven’t lifted weights in a year, but still...Hope.

This past Sunday, I went with my newish husband, our kids, their partners, grandson, and 2 dogs to cut down a tree. We hemmed and hawed over several and then found the perfect one. One of the 4 strapping young men we brought with us got down on his knees and cut it down in 2 minutes. Then 2 others picked it up and carried it.

I find as I age, I no longer need to prove myself. I’m so happy when people carry things for me or open doors for me. It doesn’t make me feel less than, it’s the opposite. It makes me feel loved and taken care of.

When we got home, we turned on the Christmas music. We set up the tree and had snacks. We laughed and talked and ate. And I said a little prayer, thanking God for hope, family, and strapping young men.

I wasn’t planning to go, but her mom reached out a week ago Sunday and asked if I would speak at the service as her co-worker and friend. These are the times you thank God and the bank for a credit line and book your trip.

As I planned this last-minute trip, I felt the need to compulsively apologize to everyone in my life. I wanted to apologize to my husband for spending so much money on airfare and a rental car and for postponing Christmas Festivities. I wanted to apologize to my son for missing his hockey tournament and the first basketball game of the season. I apologized profusely to Ianthia’s family for bawling my face off when I got to the visitation. If there were a competition for people who make themselves feel worse than they already do, I would be a gold medal winner.

Even on the day of the funeral, I felt so off - like an imposter who shows up and is given entry into a place she hasn’t earned. Even after Ianthia’s sister Sharon said to me “You’re family” and insisted I ride in the limo with them to the funeral and sit with the family, I still felt strange.

I kept telling myself to try and be smaller and not take up too much space. When they asked me to come sit in Ianthia’s mom’s living room the morning of the funeral, I said I would just wait outside. They kept insisting so I went in and met all the cousins, aunts, uncles, etc. And of course, just like Ianthia, they were warm and kind.

It’s weird because as a trained death doula, I’d say I’m a pretty big proponent of allowing yourself to grieve and feel whatever you need to feel. But when it came down to it, I was struggling to let myself feel.

As I was sitting in the high school gymnasium for the funeral, and the soloist was singing about love and hope and faithful servants, I took a deep breath. I admitted to myself that I was so sad. So freaking sad. And that that was ok. I’m allowed to be sad. I kept hearing a line from one of Sarah McLachlan's songs in my head, “And if I shed a tear I won’t cage it. I won’t fear love.”

And for me, the cage opened and the tears fell. And I didn’t try to stop them. Here is what I said at Ianthia’s funeral:

I’ve always told my kids that you can do just about any job if you have good co-workers. And I happen to know that for a fact. My name is Sara, and I’m one of the lucky people who got to work with Ianthia.

In the summer of 1997, right after I finished college, I got a job in the file room on the third floor of Colonial Bank in Huntsville. I borrowed my mom’s skirt and my dad’s car, and off to work I went. The first 4 weeks were super boring, but then a new person showed up. She was 27 or 28, professionally dressed, and had a warm smile. We would be working in the file room together. Ianthia came in quiet and reserved, but that flew out the window within 2 days. We were instant friends. Our job consisted of handing files to people who came to our window and entering data in the oldest computers I had ever seen. These were the days before the internet, so we had to make our own fun. We’d chat about movies or what we were watching on TV. We talked about our favorite foods and trips we wanted to take. She’d share stories about her sweet baby Brook and the different milestones she was going through.

Huntsville Hospital, which was across the street from the bank, started having “Baked Potato Tuesdays” where you could buy a baked potato for 2.50 and load it with all sorts of amazing toppings. Every Monday, Ianthia and I would say to each other “I’m going to bring a healthy lunch tomorrow.” And every Tuesday morning we’d come in and say “I’m getting a potato, you want to come?” It became a tradition.

About a month after we started working together, Ianthia said she found a lump in her breast and that she was scared to have it checked out. Me, being a know-it-all 22-year-old who had watched alot of ER episodes, said it was probably just a cyst but she should have it tested. She did, and a couple of weeks later, on Oct. 7, 1997, she got the call saying her results were in. Because I was getting off work at the same time as her appointment, I said “I’ll go over there with you.” We laughed and joked the whole ride over. We even joked around when they led us into a quiet room in the back. Then the doctor said, “I’m sorry to tell you this, but you have breast cancer.” I can’t imagine how she felt at that moment. I truly, I can’t imagine. We drove back to the bank and got her car and I followed her home. She fell into her husband Fraser’s arms, while I talked with her sister and little Brook. It is a day I’ll never forget.

Here is the thing about Ianthia: after surgery and chemo, she came back to work. Sure, she was tired, sometimes taking cat naps behind the filing cabinets, but her positive spirit and faith were abounding. She knew her Lord and Savior, and she knew He had a plan for her life. Our conversations took on a deeper meaning. We still laughed and joked around, but we also talked about life and faith and hope and love. And when my own mom got sick a month later with lung cancer and had her lung removed, the first person to come sit with me in the hospital was Ianthia. And when I came back to work and complained about how hard it was to work full time and take care of my mom, Ianthia listened sympathetically. She could have said “Imagine how hard it is for me, working full-time, Having cancer, and Taking care of a baby!” but she didn’t. She just listened.

The following June, I got married and moved to Canada. We kept in touch through social media. When my mom died 2 years later, Ianthia was there with a big hug and a listening ear. Every time I came back to Alabama after that, we would try to meet and catch up. They were the highlight of my trips home.

My dad passed away in February 2022 and while most people stayed home because of the pandemic, Ianthia put on her mask and came out, once again to lift me up and encourage me. Because that is who she was.

The last time I saw Ianthia in person was Sept 2023. She was supposed to come to my wedding with some of her family in July 2023 but the cancer had come back. When we chatted over snacks in her dining room, she said she was already planning when she could get up to see me. We talked about the places we would visit and the foods I wanted her to try. We were excited. We were making plans.

I want you all to know, that it is one of the greatest honors of my life, being able to speak about what it was like to know Ianthia, as a co-worker and friend. I know that probably most of you are related to her and knew her all your life. And for that, I am jealous. Because knowing her 28 years was not nearly enough.

There is a movie out right now called Wicked and one of my favourite songs in the movie is called For Good. Whenever I think Of it, I think of Ianthia. The last line says:

Who can say if I’ve been changed for the better, but, because I knew you, because I knew you, I have been changed for good.

My favorite day of the year in that church was Thanksgiving. Every Thanksgiving, Margie’s brother’s, Neil and William, would get to the church at a ridiculous time in the morning and cook everyone and their uncle breakfast, which promptly started at 7 am. We’d all stumble in, bleary eyed and yawning, to the delicious smells of homemade biscuits and gravy, crispy bacon, hot coffee - my mouth is watering as I type. When Neil and William “retired”, Margie’s nephews, the Willis boys, took up the cooking. I’m pretty sure no one made them do it; they volunteered on their own accord. They were a polite bunch, who would nod and smile sleepily and say “Yes ma’am” and “no sir” and knew how to cook grits. The perfect southern gentlemen. Long live the Willis boys!

After everybody had had their fill of breakfast, we would all pile in the sanctuary and sing some hymns and have some time where we could share what we were thankful for over the past year. My dad was a performer, so he was usually the first one to stand up and wax eloquent about God’s blessings in his family and community. He never said he was thankful for the sound of his own voice but deep down, we all knew he was.

On Thanksgiving of 1999, after we had all piled into the sanctuary and sang “It is well,” Pastor Charlie asked if anyone wanted to share. We all waited expectantly for my dad to stand up, so we were surprised to see my mom grab the pew in front of her, slowly pull herself up, and say “I’m thankful for another year of life.” Then she sat back down. At this point, my mom had struggled with lung cancer for two years and had had several brain tumors removed. She had reason to be thankful for sure. But my mom was so shy, for her to speak in public was an anomaly. We were all in tears. Of course, my dad stood up after that and gave his state of the union Thanksgiving speech.

The last time I was at the church was last September. I had flown home for my high school reunion. The parking lot is all paved now. I drove past the church and into the cemetery to lay flowers on my parents’ graves. I sat in the grass and contemplated life. I thought about all the good times I had in that cemetery playing capture the flag (weird, I know). I thought of Dad’s funeral and the marine playing Taps. I thought of all the times I’d come to visit my mom’s grave before my dad joined her. I thought about all the times someone had left fake flowers at mom’s grave and I had to throw them away immediately( she hated plastic flowers) . I thought of the smell of grits. If I’m ever back at Prosperity for Thanksgiving, I’ll be the first one to stand up and say all that I’m thankful for.