Missing beauty...............

Beauty comes in many forms. There is beauty in art.  There is beauty in feeling joy in your heart.  There is beauty in words. There is beauty in the small details of a door handle and there is beauty in the grandness of a sunset. There is beauty in having people who love you and in the people you love. 

Beauty is all around us.  This post was generated by photos of Paris on my TV as I sat reading a book about the beauty that managed to be found in a small German town in Nazi Germany.  The photos made my heart ache tonight.  They tore me in two, between the want, the overwhelming need to be in the place where I am more me than anywhere else, and between knowing how much love I have here, from my kids and my grandkids and my family.  I feel torn between those two worlds and I have no idea how to reconcile wanting them both. 

So yes, I am missing the beauty of Paris.  Of taking my long walks and revelling in the wonders to be discovered at every step, at every street, at every museum, in every park, in every door, every window, every stunning blue sky at dusk and searing sunset over the Seine.  I'm missing the beauty of just sitting and feeling pure joy, of trying to just absorb it all so I won't forget those fleeting moments that calmed my mind and fed my soul. 

But as I thought about how to write these words and how to express what I was missing, I realized I was missing another kind of beauty.............the beauty of the peace that comes from knowing that those you love are ok.  That they are happy and carefree and have life to look forward to.

That beauty was stolen from me 6 months ago when Abby passed away. It was stolen from my son who lost his only child after watching her suffer for 22 unbearably long months.  It was stolen from my daughter and my grandsons who lost their niece and their cousin.  None of us will ever again have the beauty of that peace that comes from not knowing endless grief. Yes, the grief will lessen its hold over time, but it will never completely go away.  I know there will not be another day for the rest of my life that I won't think about Abby, about what she went through, about how my son sacrificed everything to be by her side, about his bottomless pain that I am powerless to take away.  Life has been irrevocably changed for all of us and the beauty of taking happiness for granted is gone.  

And so, as much as I miss Paris and its beauty, in every shape, way and form, it's nothing compared to how I miss the beauty of life before Abby got sick.  How I miss the beauty of knowing my family is intact, happy and looking forward to the future.  I'll miss that beauty for the rest of my life. 

I know there are no words that can ever make sense of losing a child.  We have to keep going and be there for those we love and who love us.  I know that Abby will live on in our hearts and in our minds and that she touched so many people. She was our beautiful little angel girl.  She taught us how to live life to the fullest, how to smile and laugh and enjoy the small moments in the midst of unimaginable despair.  

So tonight I'll miss her beauty and the beauty of my family's peace but tomorrow I'll try to live my life in a way that honours everything she meant to us.

Miss you so much, our little Abu.