Things I Love (May 2024 Edition)

and things that tether me to life

Mid-May marks a great divide in my life. First, the days before my father’s sudden death, and now the days after. This is the second time I have lost a parent, and it is neither the same nor easier this time. Grief is unpredictable—this is one thing I am learning the older I get and the more I recount the losses of my life. I recognize the waves of sadness, the lost feeling that comes and goes, the feeling that I am untethered to a ground that was once solid beneath my feet. When I think of the immensity of what has happened, I start to lose my footing.

I have peace. I know my father is in the hands of God. I know that I will see him again in heaven. I know that his life was profound and beautiful, that God was merciful to him all his life, even to the end. I know that this life is not all there is.

And yet, I grieve and I wander a little aimlessly around my life, trying to continue to live while wrestling with the hard facts that people die. That death is a part of the story. My story. The story of those I love. That this does and will happen. And that I wish my father were still here.

While there are so many huge questions to grapple with, it feels unimportant to write a letter talking about things I love. Except that, as the last ten days have passed, I have realized that the simple rhythms of our life, and the small beauties in it are the things that are holding me up and drawing me nearer to God, nearer to trust, nearer to hope. These little things are helping me find my way when I feel lost. They are pulling me back down to the solid earth when I start to feel like I am wandering up and away.

And so, here are some of the things I love that are anchoring me to life right now.

These Letters: I make sense out of my life by writing. Even if no one in the world ever read what I wrote, I would still do it, because this is the only way I can understand what I think and how I feel. Sometimes it takes me days of snatches of silence to put a coherent thought together and work it out in words. But I do it because it helps me through my life. I am so honored that you value these words enough to read them. Knowing that you are here is a comfort and a joy to me.

Hannah Coulter: I reread Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry earlier this month. I had just finished it before my father’s heart attack, and many of the phrases about loss were still fresh in my memory. The part where Hannah just finds out that her husband is going to die and she is “beating the hell out of a dozen egg whites” (and wonders why in the world she decided to make a cake, but it was what her hands found to do, and she cries into the bowl while asking Nathan if he is just going to die then and ends up throwing the whole frothy mess into the sink) has come to mind many times. The book is a moving and quietly heroic story of a woman who learns to live and live again through grief and finds beauty in what remains. It is one of those books that I will hold onto forever, but the words comfort me especially in times like these.

Gilead: And yesterday, I started rereading Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, one of my most favorite novels. I was in a bookstore years ago and saw the title, picked it up, read the first page and bought it. (I never do this.) “I told you last night that I might be gone sometime, and you said, Where, and I said, To be with the Good Lord, and you said, Why, and I said, Because I’m old, and you said, I don’t think you’re old…” The story goes on in this beautiful, lyrical way, a memoir written by an old preacher who has just learned he is dying. He is writing about his life for his young son to read when he is grown. It is beautiful and hopeful, and a good story to read when you are grieving.

The Penderwicks: I finished the 5-book series while nursing the baby over the last month. Though these books are fun and funny, I can also see how reading them has given my children a glimpse into grief before it hit us. I highly recommend this series to older kids and teens—it is a great series about a family that goes through many adventures, getting in and out of scrapes, learning to live through loss and change, and what it means to be a family. The books are warmly written and full of surprises, a true delight to read.

Daily Rhythms: I have found that in the last few days, the daily rhythms that we have set in place are holding me like an anchor.

Making Coffee: A friend was purging her pantry, changing some of her daily habits, and brought us several jars of really good dark roast coffee and two bottles of gourmet vanilla extract. I had been taking a break from coffee for a long while, mostly due to pregnancy-related issues, and I have to say that the morning after I came home from the hospital, I felt a real gratitude for the simple pleasure of drinking a cup of coffee out of my favorite handmade mug.

Writing in a Journal: The most grounding rhythm of my life, I come back to the blank page with the questions that don’t have answers. I find that the worries and fears and regrets that are wordless in my mind drain me, but putting them into phrases and writing them on paper is a way of praying and releasing them so that I can live more fully. A journal is a safe place to go. It is a home for me.

Meals Shared: This has been a week of meals shared, not only with my husband and children, but with my extended family, church family, and friends. We have had friends reach out and bring food for us, and as we have gathered to eat, I have seen the kindness of God to give us good friends who love and care for us, who share life with us. Sharing meals with those you love is such a gift. In the wake of a great loss, you realize these simple rhythms are the ones that are the most beautiful.

Growing Things: I have been walking around my yard seeing all the beautiful things my father, who was an amazing gardener, put there. I woke up the day after the funeral wanting to make my world more beautiful. I have some flowers in pots on my porch that are going in the ground today. I want to do my part to bring beauty to this world that feels like it is missing something. I want to bring life—in my home, in the garden, in these words that I hope to plant as seeds. I want to watch good things grow.

Being With Family: There is more to say here than I can say in a short paragraph, but my father’s passing has made me think a lot about my eight siblings, and what they have meant to me all my life. I think of my own nine children and how they will one day be grown, what I hope for them, how I want them always to love one another and be there for one another. I am so grateful to have been loved and to be loved by my brothers and sisters. Siblings are friends who share a whole lifetime’s history, who understand things about you no one else in this world will ever know. Family is such a gift, and I am thankful in times like these, that just like me, my children have many siblings to share in the joys and sorrows and memories of their lives. Each one of these brothers and sisters they have will be someone who will help them live on through.

The baby: The baby is a balm for my soul. His smiles touch something deep within me and all of us. He is eight weeks old, and is in that stage of smiling so big that it looks like he is soundlessly laughing. His dear little face draws me out of despair. His precious, devoted love is the perfect picture of the way I want to trust God. Simply, contentedly, without fear or regret. Knowing He will meet every need as it comes, resting in that.

Sending love, dear friends. Thank you so much for being here with me. I pray that you will notice the beautiful things, that God will anchor you to your own good life, that you will live and love right on through every trial, and that He will give you peace like a baby with his mother, calmed and quieted in his His love.

Mackenzie

from my journal, april 2024

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From the Archive:

I keep coming back to a short piece I wrote after the death of my mother, called The Girl in This Photograph (Me by the Sea, 1985), published in Fathom Magazine July of 2022.

“Hope is the whole motion of the ocean, but grief comes in waves and lasts till it passes…”

Also, This Song:

I wrote this song right before Randy and I bought our first house. We had been married a year, and we were going to yard sales and thrift stores looking for things to fill it up. At a yard sale, we met a woman who was selling everything she had, moving to a one-room apartment to be with her husband who was dying. It struck me how far on the other side of life we were. I cried in the car, and came home and wrote this song about not wanting to take this love for granted…

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