2017 Life Logs, Days 150: Unexpected Beginning
Date: Tuesday, May 30, 2017
Weather: Mostly Cloudy; High 60’s, Low 50’s degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA
The day had a bit of an unexpected, but very special beginning. I got up and headed out for a morning walk to the beach. I followed the Falmouth Road Race final mile course and in twenty minutes I made it to the finish line. There are some benches there and I decided to take a break, have a seat, and just enjoy the view. But as I approached the benches, I very clearly felt Mark’s presence. On the Tuesday before he died in September, we drove to this spot with my sister and brother-in-law and sat on those benches enjoying the view of Vineyard Sound. Mark must have decided to return there this morning to be with me. It was such a strong feeling it almost took my breath away. It was a very special moment that I’ll call it my belated Memorial Day experience. Mark, I miss you more than any words can express and cherish our moment together this morning. I’ll commemorate that moment by posting a photo of Mark hugging my sister on that spot last September. It is one of my very favorites.
Once I got home, I settled in for a long day of sorting through my plastic bin filled with genealogy files. After working on the family history project yesterday, I decided that I needed to go back and sort through the files to remind myself of what I already know. That escalated into a full organization project, but it was very helpful. I have been working on this project off and on for almost 25 years and throughout those years, I collected information and just piled it in a plastic bin. Now it is neatly filed in notebooks—one for Mark’s mother’s family, the Bryants and the Gramms; one for Mark’s father’s family, the Handleys and the Sullivans; one for my mother’s family, the Biggs and the Millers; and one for my father’s family, the Martins and the Goodwins. I have three weeks to get my mother and father’s story written to share with the family at our West Virginia gathering. I think there will be many more days between now and the family gathering when I find myself sitting here at my computer surrounded by those files.
