Over the past two years Karmin has been working on a book documenting Grants life…a book allowing up to three hundred pages telling the story of an amazing person inside and out. When thinking and looking back at memories whether we knew someone all that well or not photographs tell a story.
Yesterday once again I brought over an arm full of memories, notes he wrote me… repeating I love my mom… to I rode my bike to the store, be back later…to photographs that revealed a glimpse of Grant in each one of his nieces and nephews.
Karmin sat there with me as my heart flooded with memories of all four of them, remembering outfit, laughing at hair style, reminiscing through pictures that brought back a whole day of memories that made me cry and for the first time a few that made me laugh.
I have 31 years of those special memories, many envelopes of hair that are dates, special cloths they wore, school projects, report cards, journals he wore in grade school, belly buttons wrapped in plastic and photographs upon photographs that documents 31 one years of the best little people I call my everything.
Yesterday as I sat by one of my boxes full of memories… not a shoe box… a wood box the size of a chest… I sorted through the best years of my life and I don’t regret one silly thing I saved. The things in that wood box are the only material things that matter; maybe losing Grant has lead me closer to the understanding of what really is significant in life…. The colorful pieces of art that hung on my refrigerator are really what mattered when I look back; not the material things that others may have envied. I cherish what I have saved, because I don’t know if I appreciated the important things in the past as much as I should have. I look back and wish only that I wouldn’t have spent so much time wanting …..But embracing what I had.
As Karmin continues documenting Grants life she has started a book for her very own baby girl, something already so beautiful, not a moment forgotten… this little girl’s arrival has been documented since before the photos of a positive result stick…
Each day since losing Grant I remind myself of the things I am thankful for…. an emotion very hard some days, feeling happy as I knew it was a sense of feeling whole. I struggle with that. I struggle with grieving so hard I can’t enjoy the things that also matter all around me.
Looking through my box of memories was not just about Grants past, digging through the photos and drawings and special clothing was about all four of my every things… digging through that box of my treasured past I found my thankfulness, I found importance, I found the best part of my life, and for that I am thankful.
Grant left a gaping hole in my heart, a hole in all of our hearts that without future only memories can fill. I know when I am blessed with this book of my boys life I wont look back at the things I wish I would have done or wish I would have had. I look back at a life I am so thankful for, a life I was so blessed to have held.
I Love you Grantie
Mama
Grant's Place 