Sunday, July 31, 2011

Day 1

I knew this was going to be hard.  I just didn't realize how much so.  After a month of spending each day with him, it's all come abruptly to a stop.  I've never felt so lost or unsure of myself.  Never had to stop and ask my wife "what do I do?"  Never looked at so many things around me and just lose all my composure.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Gone from my sight

As my time with you grows short, I sit here by your side, thankful for the past 3 weeks we've had running around like crazy to all your doctors, treatment centers and Milky Way/Ice Cream trips.  In many ways, these 3 crazy weeks have brought us closer together than ever before and I wouldn't trade a minute of them.  I'd give anything for just one day more.  So many things I wanted to ask you that we never got around to talking about.  So many movies we need to see.  So many cartons of Ice Cream left that need to be eaten.  Love you dad.


Someone was kind enough to share the following little essay with me today and I wanted to share it with our friends and family.  Regardless of what you believe in, these few simple paragraphs sum things up nicely.  It helped me and I share it with all of you in hopes that it will someday help you in return.

     I am standing upon the seashore.  A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean.  She is an object of beauty and strength.  I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.


     Then someone at my side says:  "There, she is gone!"
      
      "Gone where?"


     Gone from my sight.  That is all.  She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side and she is just as able to bear the load of living freight to her destined port.


     Her diminished size is in me, not in her.  And just at the moment when someone at my side says:  "There, she is gone!"  There are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices ready to take up the glad shout:  "Here she comes!"


     And that is dying.


-Henry Van Dyke