thoughts on a variety of things.
Friday, March 1, 2002 -- 4:12pm
Posted by Bar


....so much for my e-mails tapering off.  There's so much to share and
Forrest isn't here to compete with for computer time, so it looks as if I'm
going to keep writing to you.  If this were a book, I guess you could say
that from here on out I'm writing the sequel to my first book.  This one
could easily be called:  "How To Survive Your Child's Death" or "How to Keep
Your Marriage Together After Your Only Child's Death".  Neither title really
works.  The stuff that I want to share now is really a continuation of what
has been happening all along.  The seriousness of Forrest's situation then
made my writing a necessity; now, the seriousness of my own situation makes
writing a necessity too.

I've spent the morning with a lovely man named Joshua Pearl.  He and his
family live here in Woodstock.  We met just before Forrest was diagnosed and
our connection has grown very strong since then.  He is an especially fine
pianist and also a great teacher.  He and I had begun working on jazz
standard repertoire in the summer of 2000, so we're basically just picking
up where we left off.  This time, however, we are starting with a project
that involves hymns that Peter and his family grew up with in their church.
I'll tell you more about that at another time, but I wanted to relate a
little part of our conversation.

He was observing for me that he'd noticed that over the last few months my
style of communication was considerably more open than your typical
"how-ya-doin'?-just-fine" sort of casual interaction.  He likes it,
apparently, and I told him that for me, the rawness which is part of my
experience right now, has made others very, very open to me.  This whole
town seems to know that I'm very fragile and to treat me gently and with
kindness.  The result is that I am taking time with people and they are
taking time with me.  On the way home from Joshua's house, for instance, I
stopped at the bank to get some money.  I wasn't prepared to bank, and so
the teller, a young man whom I really like, helped me find account numbers
and to focus my wandering brain.  At the end of the transactions, he put a
purple lollipop in front of me knowing full well that purple was Forrest's
favorite color, first of all, and that one of Forrest's most favorite things
to get was a purple lollipop.  It was a gift and I was very glad to receive
it.  Mostly I enjoyed knowing that he cared without actually saying any
words.

Anyway, I was telling Joshua about how wonderful it is to be in town these
days.  Everyone is sweet to me and I'm sustained and kept sane by the love
that surrounds me.  I told him about meeting my friend Tom Miller for coffee
yesterday morning at the local coffee shop called Heaven.  When I walked in,
I knew everyone in the place by name and literally walked from table to
table getting hugs and kisses from each one of them.  It felt GREAT.  I was
receiving their love and each of them was giving me their love, and as
Joshua pointed out, how appropriate that we were in a cafe called Heaven.
We both smiled at the knowing of heaven as a place where love flows freely
from one to another and that we are able to create that here.  Like
everything, it's a matter of choice.....

I'm afraid this e-mail will be long, but I'll carry on knowing that with one
stroke of a key you can delete me if you wish.

I wanted to tell you about Beach Day on Monday at Forrest's school.  Mostly
I would say it was not enjoyable.  We did what we had to do.  We connected
with one little boy who needed to know that we were still on the planet and
that we cared.  We played with the kids who seemed to want to connect with
us, but mostly we felt like we no longer belonged there - and we don't.  It
wasn't a terrible feeling, it was just an honest observation.  We did not
stay long.  Interestingly, the children seemed to like that we were there,
it was their parents who were uncomfortable.  That's understandable.  They
want to protect their children from any more sadness and in some ways we
represent sadness to them now.  That will ease up, I'm sure, but for now,
it's the way it is.  It was a break that needed to be made and it is done.

Needless to say, the hours after Beach Day were hard.  Both Peter and I were
lost for what to do.  By the late afternoon I was back on my feet and
feeling like I could manage so I went out to visit Forrest's grave.  It was
a beautiful winter afternoon - warm enough to sit comfortably and enjoy the
quiet that only graveyards seem to offer.  As I was sitting there, I noticed
a small gathering of crows off in the distance.  A few minutes later I
looked back and there were about a hundred crows gliding together in a very
tight group.  They were quiet and did not flap their wings as they moved in
and around one another.  I thought to myself that it would be nice if they
came over to me just so that I knew for sure they were there for me, and
sure enough, they started moving my way.  Over the course of 15 minutes they
moved towards me and gradually were right above my head.  It was incredible!
Easily the second most beautiful thing I have ever seen in nature...Forrest
being the first.  I watched them as they circled around me another quarter
turn and as they did so, they spread out and flew off in many directions and
disappeared.  I KNOW it was a gift to me from somewhere.  I felt for sure
that God was telling me that everything is ok.  It was too beautiful and too
unusual to be anything other than a gift.  It's one of those things I cannot
prove but that I absolutely know.

I have more to write, but I think that I will wait for another surge of
energy on another day.  I'll leave you with this:  the other day I was
speaking with a man who loved Forrest very much but did not see him often.
He lives in town here and wanted to know the specifics of Forrest's death.
I told him and we spoke very honestly for a long time.  When I told him that
the last year-and-a-half had been the best time of my life, he looked at me
with complete disbelief.  I'm sure many people would agree with him that it
could not possibly have been a good time for me.  But I must tell you, being
a mommy and knowing love the way I have known it, feeling Forrest's love
coming back at me in every single moment, and living life with all the gusto
we could muster (before and after cancer was in our lives), made my life as
wonderful as life can be.  Illness, even death, could not have taken
anything from my happiness.  Forrest was a joy to be around.  How could that
be anything less than the best thing that has come into my life?  I guess
the message that I am trying to send to you is that being a parent is the
greatest job there is and I am very, very glad to have been one.

Love to you all,
Bar

PS I've just re-read this e-mail and wonder if I shouldn't add that Peter
and I are doing fine in our marriage......that potential book title in the
first paragraph might lead you to believe otherwise.  We struggle with what
to say to one another now and with what to do together.  Our grief goes in
cycles:  one of us is strong when the other is not, but even when we're the
strong one, there's no comfort to be given, really.  Ultimately, I think
we'll be ok.  Right now, truth is, it's really hard.  Time will be our
friend, I can tell you that already.  Our families and friends reminding us
of what our love is all about will help a lot.  And mostly, our friendship
will carry us forward.  We've been on an intense journey together and have
clearly embarked on yet another.  It's the stuff of life and I'm thinkin' we
will dig in.....b

more and more and more stuff
Sunday, March 3, 2002 -- 11:48pm
Posted by Bar


I'm having trouble today.  The emotions that are surfacing are not familiar
in any way, and I don't understand them.  It feels as though my sadness is
getting worse, not better.  I have moments, even long stretches, when I feel
pretty damn good considering, and then I get slammed in ways that I don't
expect.  Mostly, it's just still impossible to believe that I will never see
Forrest again.  And seeing him is only part of it.  I desperately miss his
voice and holding him, and sleeping beside him and nursing him and just
plain having him around.  Sometimes I feel comfort knowing that I might see
him again when my own life is over.  The last couple of days, though, it
seems I can hardly handle the thought of having to wait maybe 30 or 40 years
to find out if I will see him again.

By then, where will he be?  Will he be reincarnated back into this world?
Is he already here in someone else's womb?  - a heart-breaking thought even
as I envy that lucky mother.  Will he drift farther and farther away from me
with every passing day, or is there some sort of time warp thing that allows
for us to re-meet in an all-knowing sort of formless way after life.  It's
all swimming around in my head and has the potential to drive me crazy.

Last night I sang at a Women's History Month Celebration.  There were 9
performers and I decided that I could handle doing the show despite my
rawness.  Singing somehow brings me closer to Forrest.  I feel as though I
am tuning in to the same higher place that he has access to and it makes me
feel very close to him.  Anyway, at intermission, a woman that I know
whispered to me that she too had lost a child and she wanted to let me know
that she knew a bit about what I was feeling.  (It's amazing how many women
there are that have lost children.  They come out of the woodwork when you
join the club).  While she and I were talking, she confessed that she was a
"die-hard Atheist".  Since our conversation, I have been struck by the
significance of her self description.  I don't know what if anything is true
about our purpose here on earth.  I have a sense that something very large
is going on that we don't know the details about.  Often I wonder if all of
the philosophy and religion that we have created around what life and death
are about is humankind's way of coping with our fear of death.  If that's
true, and I don't think it is by the way, then we're pretty darn scared of
the unknown and have been for millions of years.  I try to imagine how I
would possibly cope with Forrest's death without having a sense of God.
It's unbearable to think about.  And yet, my friend seems to be holding up.
She's sane.  I see her walking nearly every day in a long loop around the
valley here.  Who knows?

I was thrown one of those unexpected curve balls at church this morning by a
very-well intentioned woman whom I had never met.  She approached me after
the service and told me that the other day she was at the local bookstore
and was compelled to buy me the book that she then handed me.  It's called
Hannah's Gift and is written by a woman named Maria Housden.  Maria lives
here in Woodstock - just recently moved here - and came to Forrest's
Memorial last week and has been very sweet in her presence for Peter and me.
She, too, lost a 3 year old to cancer 7 years ago.  When she saw the article
about Forrest in our local newspaper, naturally she wanted to come to the
celebration and be with all of us who knew him.  I did not know she had
written a book about her daughter Hannah's life, and when Mary gave me a
copy of the book, such an onslaught of nasty and painful emotions came up
that I'm not sure I want to be writing the next paragraph!

I felt jealousy - that she had written the book that I might someday write;
like my thoughts (translate:  Forrest's life) were somehow not needed
because Maria had already written down her thoughts.  I felt sadness beyond
belief that Forrest's life, like Maria's daughter, Hannah's, was somehow
going to be put in a folder entitled:  3 year olds who have lived full lives
and changed the world.  I am NOT ready in the least bit to put Forrest in
any folder of any description - even a folder as important as that one.
Like any mother, I feel and felt like Forrest was special - even extra
special - even more special?  and I felt my desperation for the world to
know that about him.  I felt I could not possibly read her book right now
because it might distract me from the very personal grieving that I am going
through by myself.  And of course I heard the very young part of myself
saying, "she's probably a great writer, and I'm nothin'" yadee yadee ya.  I
must tell you that I am not particularly proud of these rather uncomfortable
emotions, but as usual, I feel compelled to share them.  The intensity of my
response suggests to me that the buttons that are being pushed need some
serious attention.  I guess it's just not the right time for me to be
beating myself up for negative emotions that surface inside me.  Truth is,
I'm just plain raw.

The main reason that I don't want to read Maria's book right now, though, is
the same reason I am not seeking out a grief counselor or therapy group:  I
don't want to share my grief with strangers.  Simple as that.  Peter and I
talked yesterday about the fact that in the past, if a mother lost her
child, the tribe or clan or whatever community in which she lived and
survived, probably had specific rituals to support her in her grief.  She
was probably propped up, fed, encouraged to wail, soothed, massaged, bathed,
whatever.  Now, with our disjointed families and lack of community, that
intimate support is not ritualized.  My personal feeling is that I want that
support!  I want the people I know to be aware of my loss and to offer me
the loving that I am so missing in Forrest's absence.  My friends here in
Woodstock are doing an excellent job of being my clan.  The point of all of
this is that I can't imagine getting that same space and freedom from people
I do not know or who are themselves grieving their own loss.  I guess I'm
selfish that way.  And I'm guessing that eventually my heart will change on
all of this.  I suspect that someday I will approach a woman who has newly
lost a child and touch her hand and tell her that I know something about
what she is feeling.  Hopefully my reaching out will give her some form of
comfort.  Hopefully I will do it at the right time.

I must add that although I am not particularly sharing my grief with anyone
other than Peter and my closest friends, I am very touched by the number of
people who have offered me their shoulder.  I don't feel like I can share my
grief or even respond to everyone, but the fact that so many are reaching
out is Enormous for me.

In recent days I have had this compelling need to tell you about Forrest's
death but I have wondered about how it would come across.  I have wanted to
describe the burial in particular because it was one of the most beautiful
and True days of my life.  I have thought about reflecting on some of the
stuff I talked about before Forrest died and how some of my thoughts have
changed.  There's so much.  How could I have gotten so lucky as to have all
of you willing listeners?  Some part of me wants to abbreviate these e-mails
so that they can be read quickly and that life for you can then go on -
reading other e-mails, having lunch, surfing the web, whatever you do after
you get these ramblings.  Truth be told, I could write for days!

I'll quit though.  Thank you for being out there and making even my lousier
days much, much better.  Each day some wonderful thing happens and reminds
me of how much I want to be in this life of mine.  Last night, at the end of
a great night of women musicians presenting their music to a very
appreciative audience, the featured singer, Michelle Holloway, a local
gospel singer and actress, called me up to stand with her in the center of
the stage area.  She told the audience, some of whom had no idea what she
was talking about, that she sort of knew what I was going through from
first-hand experience.  She said that although she and I had not met before,
she wanted to sing her last song for me.  She took both of my hands, turned
me towards her and created a gospel prayer song as she looked me right in
the eyes.  She sang right to me at first, and then opened up and sang to God
on my behalf.  She sang hard and loud and with all the conviction she had,
and I stood there 12 inches from her voice and could not believe my good
fortune.  Amazing!  Moments later, after the audience dispersed, her 12 year
old daughter approached me with very loving eyes.  She wanted a hug.  I told
her that I had liked her the moment I had seen her (when I had arrived at
the show) and she told me the same.  I gave her a copy of Confession because
she liked "His Mother's Legacy" so much.  These moments in life make life
worth living for me.  They are moments full of love and compassion and the
stuff of goodness.

Be well everyone. With love,

Bar

Acceptance
Friday, March 8, 2002 -- 4:02pm
Posted by Bar


It's Friday afternoon nearly a month since I held Forrest for the last time.
It's hard to believe it's only a month.  It seems like eons since I saw him.

I've spent the morning gathering up more of his things to donate to a local
shelter.  I filled the car with cool stuff but the house is still very full
with Forrest.  A part of me is glad to shed some of his property; a part of
me doesn't want to get rid of even one little eensy-weensy plastic hippo.
It wasn't fun sorting through his things, but it wasn't horrible either.
I'm not skipping happily down Memory Lane yet, but I guess I'm getting
glimmers of that possibility periodically.

There are a lot of paradoxes.  For instance, it's really nice to have a full
day to do whatever I want to do; unfortunately, what I really want to do is
no longer possible.  I'm also getting more sleep and I do feel better, but
my body still wakes up during the night and I realize in my sleepiness that
in fact, Forrest is gone.  People are calling me for music work and I'm
available.  That's nice, too.

I took a walk this morning and composed several hundred e-mails to you while
on route.  Each letter was wise and beautifully written.  But as I sit here,
those imaginary letters are long gone from my brain.  There is one subject
that sticks with me, so I'll try to recreate my thoughts.

About two weeks ago at church, Tom Miller, our minister, put a list out for
interested people to sign-up on.  He was looking for those who might like to
enact the Passion story for Palm Sunday.  I signed up thinking that I would
like to have something like that to do.  A week ago, the ten of us who
signed-up, got together to hash out how this drama might come to life.  Tom
is a professional actor as well as minister, so he has a lot of experience
pulling together players for a performance.  The first task was to try to
recall from memory the details of the events leading up to Good Friday.  I
was late for that part of the gathering but I can tell you that I basically
remember very little of the details for lack of attention in my childhood to
things like Sunday School.  Anyway, by the time I got there, Tom was ready
for us to read together the version of the Passion according to Matthew.  As
you can probably imagine, I was not too focused, nor was I willing to read
or talk much about a rather emotional and powerful death story.  My own
story was eclipsing pretty much everything.  Everyone else read out loud and
I tried to listen but all I could think was how very little the words were
resonating with me.  I was bored and feeling as though it was all very stiff
and life-less.  I almost had the courage (and the excuse) to exit myself but
I decided to do the polite thing and stick it out.  When the reading was
over, Tom, in his infinite wisdom, opened the floor to discussion.  His
objective was to bring personal reflection to the story.  He wanted us all
to talk about how we felt as we read; he wanted to hear our personal
reactions.  BINGO.  It was a brilliant move on his part and suddenly the
group became very animated and my interest perked up.  I could hear the
other's enthusiasm and their confusion and their curiosity and I was quite
willing to take part.  We each called out words that described how we felt,
or reactions we'd had.  I called out "Betrayal" and "Acceptance".  Others
felt "Resignation".  One woman was struck by Pilate's inability to take
control and act on his responsibility.  I confessed my boredom with the text
and others concurred; still others disagreed with me.  You can imagine that
it was a lively and really provocative hour of debate.  What fascinated me
the most was the range of emotions and responses that this most significant
Christian story provoked.

When we'd finished, Tom suggested that we each choose one of our reactions,
spend the week refining our thoughts, and then gather for the second
rehearsal in a week - that would be tomorrow morning.  So I chose
"acceptance" for obvious reasons.  What followed, then, was yet another
layer of human response:  Tom asked me when I thought "Acceptance" should be
presented if we were to enact the play somehow and interject our thoughts as
the drama unfolded.  He assumed I would want to bring it in around the scene
of Jesus in the Garden on the night before His death, but that didn't feel
right to me.  Someone else suggested during The Last Supper.  Still didn't
feel right to me.  Another person suggested that acceptance occurred as He
walked to the Crucifixion.  I finally spoke up and said that I thought
acceptance was what happens in the very final moments; at the end of life -
no earlier.  It was a clarifying moment for me.  When Forrest was dying, and
we knew he had only a few minutes at most, I still thought that a miracle
might be possible and I considered praying fervently to that end.  But my
higher self did not call for it.  My body and my soul knew that his time had
come and that it was also time for me to stand back and allow his soul's
journey to continue.  It was a very powerful few seconds of acceptance and
Forrest continues to move forward without resistance.

Likewise, I think even Jesus was kind of thinking it would be nice to stay
on the planet a little longer, even in his last hours.  He asks "Why hast
Thou forsaken me?"  Christ, hanging on the cross, as human as can be, is
basically scared and confused, and maybe not even quite sure of himself
there at the end.  That's a powerful way for that story to end for me.  His
acceptance, like Forrest's, (and mine), probably came in his final breath.
How could it be otherwise?

The other thing I liked about our discussion was how differently we all felt
about The Passion story, and how true each of our responses was.  No one was
wrong and yet none of us particularly agreed or needed the same thing from
the story.  The text was not important to me; critical for others.  One
woman felt she could not express her personal feelings; others, (me?), were
bursting at the seams to let our feelings out.  It confirms for me yet again
that there are a million, gazillion paths to the Truth, to God, to the Light
- however you want to describe it.  I appreciate knowing that others
understand that there are multiple, even divergent, paths to God.

Thank you for letting me do my homework with you this afternoon.  Acceptance
is a big one for me - maybe even the whole ball o' wax.  Not just acceptance
of death, but acceptance of life too.  It's sort of akin to responsibility
for me.  It's as if I have to take responsibility for what is true in my
life, accept it, live it, feel it and learn from it.  It's helped me a lot
to have seen Forrest do that so well.

In my beautifully crafted letters to you in my head this morning, I
seamlessly segued from my treatise on acceptance into a description of
Forrest's death and burial......but that brilliance eludes me now.  Another
day, perhaps.

Enjoy this spectacular afternoon.  It's 63 degrees here now where it could
well be snowing and cold.  I love it.  Time for another walk.

Love, love, love,
Bar

Sunday Afternoon
Sunday, March 10, 2002 -- 5:29pm
Posted by Bar


A month has gone by.  I have been crying hard this morning.  When I really
cry, I can hardly get my breath.  I feel like I might suffocate and I have
to shed any blankets that are on me.  This morning my sadness was triggered
by thoughts of Forrest's little seizures a few hours before he died.  I
thought he was trying to get his IV out, but his arm was seizing up.  It's
an uncomfortable memory and I thank God that that sort of physical
distortion came-on only in the end and that the episodes were brief and
painless.

Friday night Peter and I were asked for the first time if we had
children.We'd been sitting in a restaurant in Kingston specifically trying
to hide a little bit, when a couple with a 6 month old son sat at the next
table.  Peter and I were both enjoying memories of Forrest at that age and
wanted to tell them how lucky they were.  Without words we both resisted the
temptation to converse with them for fear we would lead them into a
conversation about our life.

The other couple did say hello finally, and we spoke for a few minutes
before we got up to leave.  As we left, we said something like, "yourson is
beautiful, how old is he?"  Then she asked, "do you have children?"and I
quickly responded, "yes, we have one".  We all agreed that being a parent
was the greatest thing in the world and her husband added that it sounded as
though we were ready for #2, and we departed.  We walked outside and joked a
little about how we could have wrecked their day by telling them the truth,
and then we both started to cry in earnest.  It was awful.  Such loneliness
and disbelief and the sinking feeling that it's actually true that we don't
have a child anymore.  I guess we have a lifetime ahead of us answering that
question.

Yesterday a friend of mine told me he was driving to Philadelphia just for
the evening and I thought it might be fun to go too.  It was very
spontaneous and very fun.  We left at 3pm and were home by 2am.  He went to
a party he couldn't miss and I went to South Street and wandered around for
a couple of hours.  Got myself dinner, walked some more, stopped for dessert
and coffee, read my book and walked some more.  I loved being off by myself
where no one knew me or my story.

I know South Street pretty well, so it was fun to go in and out of stores
with no particular direction.  I haven't enjoyed that kind of anonymity or
freedom for a long time and it was good for me.  I rejoined my friend at the
party around 10pm and as I was grabbing my things to go I heard one of the
guests say "Bar?"  I turned to see a man I've known since Kindergarten and
it was a wonderful surprise.  He went on and on about how well I looked, was
I still singing?  how'd I been?  had I recorded anymore - he wanted to catch
up with me since our last high school reunion 10 years ago.  I was really
pleased that he thought I looked so well.  The adventure to South Street
must have done me some good, I thought.  I wondered about telling him what
was really going on with me.  Finally I decided to tell him,and of course he
was speechless.  He's a dad.  He's got a 3 year old and he was stunned.  He
put his forehead on mine and told me how sorry he was.  He welled-up and
after a few moments asked if it had been a surprise or was Forrest sick?
And this was the part that was hard for me.  I realized that I had to
summarize the whole thing for him into a 2 or 3 sentence
cocktail-party-style conversation.  He didn't require my sparseness, but the
occasion did.  I had to think about how to answer, so I said "Well, this is
the first time I have had to answer that question so I'm not sure I know
how".  I took a moment and then I told him that Forest's final day was a
complete surprise to everyone; that there was a brain tumor that we didn't
know about.  I said he'd had liver and lung cancer too, but that he had been
doing miraculously well.  I told him Forrest was amazing and that I missed
him and loved him more than anything and then I quit talking about it.  I
realized that I wasn't ready to be casual or brief about Forrest's life, and
I also heard myself sounding like a mom trying to convince someone who
wasn't there that my beautiful son was not an invalid.  He let me off the
hook, gave me his card and asked me to please call him so that we could
finish our conversation later.  He was very respectful and gentle and I was
grateful to him for teaching me that I need to spend some time thinking
about how to answer that question the next time it comes up.

This morning I told Peter about it.  I told him that for now I think it's
best for me to withhold the cancer part of Forrest's life story to people I
don't know well.  Here's the reason:

Pretty much everyone assumes that if a person has died from cancer that they
have suffered unbearable pain, that their body slowly and miserably failed,
that they were a burden, that they were sickly and yellow and unable to eat,
and basically better off being dead.  They think the person who has died has
lost a battle of some sort and that their life was about suffering or about
awful therapies that ultimately did not work.

I find myself wanting to scream:

NONE OF THAT IS TRUE FOR FORREST, FOR ME, FOR PETER OR FOR ANYONE WHO KNEW
US!!

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE BELIEVE ME.  DO NOT PROJECT YOUR GRISSLY PICTURE OF
CANCER ONTO ME OR MY SON.  HIS LIFE WAS FULL, HAPPY, ENERGETIC, NORMAL AND
HEALTHY, OF ALL THINGS, SO PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE DO NOT PAINT HIM OTHERWISE
IN YOUR MIND!!!

And even as I scream these things inside of myself I realize that there will
always be those who view Forrest as a sickly little boy because their
experience of cancer forces them to see Forrest that way.  And there
will always be people thinking I'm delusional and crazy to think of my little
buddy as healthy.

So.....I think that for now I will give myself permission to say to those
who ask how he died that I'd rather not talk about it right then' perhaps at
another time.

The reason this issue of Forrest's memory is so heavy for me now is mostly
because he just died, but also because a couple of uncomfortable things have
happened that have forced me to want to scream-out in this way.

The other day a friend of mine sent me a copy of a newsletter she
receives from a local hospital.  In the newsletter was an announcement of
Forrest's death and reflection.  The woman who'd written the announcement
quoted the e-mail she'd received from another friend of ours conveying the
news.  Our e-mail friend was obviously very sad to have to report Forrest's
death and he tried to paint a picture of Forrest's heroism and strength, but
ultimately, the picture he painted suggested that after so much cancer
therapy, Forrest's body finally could take no more.  His words broke my
heart.  Here was a very public newsletter conveying to hundreds of people
who had been praying for Forrest, apparently, that therapy had finally done
him in, and that, by association, he had had a prolonged hospital-style
decline.

Obviously I cannot control everything people think even though I desperately
want to.  People are going to believe what they believe, but seeing it in
print was a real heart breaker.

The other thing that has happened that leaves me sad and confused is the
tension that has developed at Forrest's school.  There are a few parents who
would like to get on with life there without the memory of Forrest around.
They object to some of the ways that Cheryl, the teacher, is helping the
children process their loss.  Some parents are challenging her ability to
know how to help their kids.  It's hard for me to understand because I am
not in their shoes, but it hurts a lot.  Each day one of the children sets
his cup for snack and, as it turns out, puts his or her cup at that same
table - that's the child's choice and I am deeply touched by it.

Someday, Forrest's friends will decide not to set his cup anymore.  Someday
the garden they are planting for him may fall into disarray, but right now
it is not time for that.  These kids need to celebrate Forrest and to feel
their loss.  They need to know that if they died that we would also
celebrate them in the same ways.  One of Forrest's friends said setting his
cup "helps me remember him".  So right.  Thank you, sweetheart.  That does
my heart good.

I feel better now.  I suspect my effort to change the world's view on
cancer, and specifically the world's view of Forrest, are somewhat in vain,
but I need to try.  I finally understand why descendants of wrongly-accused
criminals want to clear their ancestor's name.  This is the stuff of my
history and is much of the way I define myself so I want the truth to be
recorded.  One of the miracles of Forrest's life is that he did not suffer,
he did not decline in death and he did not miss a thing in his short stay
here.

I'm exhausted.  Time for a walk and a shower to shake some of this stuff
off.

Enjoy the coming spring. Can you believe it?

With love,
Bar

March 12, 2002
Wednesday, March 13, 2002 -- 12:19pm
Posted by Bar


March 12, Tuesday night, 9:25

Peter and I agree that it's as hard to believe that Forrest is dead as it is
to believe that he was ever here.  As I was brushing my teeth tonight, I
wondered if it was really possible that I used to hold Forrest on my lap on
the side of the bathtub and brush his teeth for him.  He liked me to do it.
I brushed and he sucked.  He liked the taste of Colgate and never got the
hang of rinsing.  I guess he would have eventually.

Funny things catch me off guard.  Tonight I spied a red glass heart in my
jewelry bowl which Santa had put in my stocking 10 weeks ago.  No more
Christmas presents from Forrest.  I didn't cry, but I felt sick to my
stomach at the thought of it.

Today I was thrown a bad curve ball by a salesman at AOL.  I was calling to
cancel my account there and he was determined to convince me otherwise.  He
was very smooth and I was in no mood for his polished salesmanship.  I'd
already had a rough morning emotionally and I was making that call in an
attempt to get something mundane done; something harmless.

After his many attempts to persude me of the error in my ways, I finally
said to him, "Excuse me.  Can I be honest with you?  My son just died and I
just can't handle this.  Could you please just cancel my account?"  The
strange thing was, he didn't miss a beat.  He did not say, "oh, I'm so
sorry" or "gosh, that's awful".  Nothing.  He said, "well, let me just close
your account for you then.  There won't be any charges, please call us back
if you want to reactivate your account" etc etc etc.

I got off the phone and broke into a long, hard cry.  First of all, I felt
like I'd exploited Forrest by using his death as a way of getting out of an
annoying phone conversation; and secondly, the AOL guy just plain didn't
care.  I guess he hears that excuse for cancellation all of the time.  I
mean, I didn't expect any more than I got, I guess, but some humanness in
his words would have helped me enormously.

The thing that got me on Monday is more personal to describe, but I'm going
to do it anyway.  It's been a long journey for all of us and you're still
here, so I'll take the risk:

Friday night, Peter and I went to Marshall's to get some much needed
clothes.  In the dressing room, I noticed that breast milk had dried on my
nipples and they were sort of crusty and dry.  It was very upsetting.  I had
sort of forgotten that my body would respond in that way to the absence of
Forrest.  Then Monday, I was standing in my room getting dressed, looking
out the window and generally feeling calm and close to Forrest.  There are
prisms in the windows and on sunny days, like Monday, rainbows float all
around the room and I feel Forrest's presence.  As I stood there, happily
enjoying our little tete-a-tete, I looked down and one of my breasts was
leaking milk.  I lost it.  I had really not understood how completely my
body and his were connected and how much my body, working on its own, would
be asking, "hey, what's goin' on around here?  Where's Forrest?  I've got
milk to feed him".

I thought about what a waste it was.  I thought about how I could offer my
milk to another child who might need it.  I thought about how wonderful
nursing Forrest was and how critical it was to our emotional survival.  I
thought about how much I miss him and I cried hard for a very long time.

                                        *

Peter called the funeral home yesterday to ask the director a question.  He
wanted to know what, if anything, Ken had seen when he prepared Forrest's
body for the grave.  Interestingly, Ken saw nothing, and Peter didn't pursue
it too thoroughly.  It turned out that Ken was very concerned about me.  He
asked Peter how I was holding up.  He said he'd thought I was too strong at
the viewing and that women like me often crash in the weeks and months
following a death.  I think there are more than a few people worried about
me in that way.

I can only say that I think I'm ok.  I don't think I'm going to crash in any
permanent way.  I do have periods when I'm so distraught that I can hardly
breathe.  Calling someone in those moments is impossible and I think not the
best thing to do anyway.  During those almost-unmanageable times, my very
primal self screams out in pain and confusion and I finally exhaust myself.
I feel crazed because I realize that Forrest may not hear me.  Wherever he
is, I know he's fine - even great and happy and bliss-filled.  I'm not
concerned about him in that way at all.  I'm still very anxious, though, not
knowing where he is - and no one can tell me for sure - and not knowing if
he can hear all of the "I love yous" I scream out in desperation.  I guess
I'm saying that I'm not as strong as I may appear, so don't you worriers
worry too much.  I'm grieving in earnest, I assure you.

I think I manage to keep my wits about me because of my faith.  My faith
isn't very specific or dogmatic, but it's true for me.  That faith is that
each of us is here on this earth for a reason.  Each of us has things we are
here to learn.  And each of us is given an exactly perfect life in which to
learn what ever it is we are meant to learn.  Forrest got what he needed,
and gave what he had, in a very short time.  To me, despite my loneliness,
there's a sense of perfection about it all.  As for me, I think that I have
needed to learn how to open my heart to the purity and possibility of
unconditional love.  Forrest gave me that beyond any words I can use to
describe it.  His gift has opened me up so wide that I am able to experience
all of the other love that surrounds me every day.

Which brings me back to the viewing and Ken's sense that I was a little too
strong for my own good.  All I can say is that that night, the quality and
intensity of the love that Peter and I felt for nearly three hours straight,
from people who had come to hug us and to love us, was so incredibly strong
that it literally held me up.  My strength was directly related to the power
of the love that was being given to us.  It was a feeling that I will never
forget; one of the most remarkable experiences of my life.

It's time to sleep.  Going to sleep, turning off the lights, and then waking
up, are the hardest times of the day.  My mind swims around in memory and my
heart responds with sadness still.  In the morning I have trouble getting
out of bed.  Once I do, I pray, I do yoga, I sing and I quiet my self.
Doing so seems to put me on a balanced footing for most of the rest of the
day.  (As long as no one from AOL calls me!)

I leave you with this quote from Emmanuel's Book - something a friend who
has lost a child also, sent to comfort me:

    Emmanuel is asked:

    "Why does someone die
    when they're very young?"

    He answers:

    "Because they have completed their task.
    There is no other reason.
    Young?
    You are all eternal.
    Once you escape
    from the time-space continuum,
    that 'young'
    becomes a very old soul"

And that is how I feel too.

Good-night everybody. Sleep well,
Bar

Another Saturday Night....
Sunday, March 17, 2002 -- 12:35am
Posted by Bar


It's 10:30 Saturday night.  I'm the only one home.  Peter went to
Pennsylvania for the weekend and Forrest is dead.  That's what keeps going
'round and 'round in my head as if I were just learning it for the first
time.  It just keeps sinking deeper and deeper in that he really is dead.

Last night after Peter left, I spent the evening here at home trying to
figure out how I felt and what I was going to do with myself.  I was enough
upset about being here alone that I decided that I would not do anything
that would even remotely challenge me emotionally:  no clearing out of
Forrest's stuff, no looking at pictures, no writing of e-mails, no nothin'.
I knew that if I started to cry I might loose it and I just could not handle
it, so I did shallow stuff all night long.  I managed to call Peter's sister
around 7:00.  Talked to her for a while and then wandered around a bit more
avoiding myself.  Then at 9, I called Steve Stiert and tried hard not to let
him know how badly I needed to connect with someone.  He figured it out I
think.  Just as I headed to bed, knowing that I was really not handling
being here alone well at all, I called my friend, Baird, and talked to him
for a while before turning off the lights.

For those of you who don't know, we live very remotely.  It is very dark
here when the lights are out.  I normally love the depth of the darkness,
but last night was different.  I realized at the moment that I was turning
off the lights that I really wanted to leave some lights on.  I kept asking
myself why I would need to do that.  When I didn't have a good answer, I
decided that I would leave the lights on anyway just because I needed to be
kind to myself under the circumstances.  I wasn't even strong enough to
pretend that I was strong enough.  It was a real breakthrough.

I didn't sleep well.  My dreams were stressful and I woke up often.  Visions
of Forrest.  Visions of Peter and me lost in long corridors with no apparent
exit.  Visions of elevators that arrive on the wrong floor.

Despite my shaky start this morning, I did get out of the house.  After a
rehearsal at the church all morning, I spent the entire afternoon learning
how to weave on a friend's 4-pedal loom.  I have wanted to learn how to
weave for a long time, and when Forrest died, Karen, my weaver friend,
invited me over to make whatever I would like on one of her looms.  We
talked most of the afternoon, which is mostly what I needed, so I only got
about an inch woven on what will be a fabulous indigo scarf someday.

Tonight I went to a concert in town.  The artists were violist Lawrence
Dutton and his wife, Elizabeth Lim- Dutton, a violinist.  They performed
Bach and Brahms, but what really made the night worthwhile for me was a
brilliant performance of a work-in-progress composed by a man named George
Tsontakis.  WOW!  It knocked my socks off.  George was at the concert and I
could tell that he was really pleased with how things had gone.  For me it
was thrilling to hear music newly written come alive before my eyes.  It
really took my mind off things and I was and am very grateful.

When I got to my car, which was parked across the street from where Forrest
is buried, I thought that maybe I would go see him.  It was really dark, and
I thought better of it.  What am I afraid of?  Who knows.  As far as I know,
nothing strange happens in graveyards at night, and yet I just decided to
avoid the challenge.  When I got home, I was grateful that I had left some
lights on for myself.  "Tonight", I thought, "I'll write an e-mail".  In
case you haven't noticed, I have nothing in particular to say.  I'm just
lonely as can be and there's only one person I know that can fill that void
and he is not available.

It's time to go to sleep.  I feel better now.  These e-mails help me
enormously and I don't understand why.

Thank you for that,
Bar

good morning
Saturday, March 23, 2002 -- 09:47am
Posted by Bar


The last e-mail I wrote was a week ago when I was pretty desperate.  I feel
as though I may have left many of you worried about my overall well-being.
I don't have much time this morning, but I wanted to assure you that Peter
and I are well and growing.  It's been a long week.  I needed quiet time
more than anything and I took it.  Peter is working full time now and is
happily distracted.  Getting home from work to an empty house is hard for
him.  The shock hits him over and over again and he is definitely
struggling.

I went to the cemetery last night on my way home.  It was beautifully clear
out and I could see without my car headlights on.  As I approached Forrest's
site, all I could see was a white form standing at his feet.  When I got
closer I realized it was a snowman and I guessed that Peter had come to
visit too.  He and Forrest loved to make snowmen together.  When I go out to
Forrest's grave it's great to discover that someone else has been there.
Often there are little goodies there that visitors have left to express
their love.  It is wonderful to know that people remember.  Fills my soul.

Before I run, I wanted to let you know that I have spent a fair amount of
time writing out the end of Forrest's life to share with you.  It has been
emotionally demanding for me so I am taking my time.  I have written it in
parts, as I am able, but decided to send all of the parts simultaneously so
that your reading of it makes more sense.  I also figured that some of you
might want to read it in sections.  I have a little more to do but I just
wanted to let you know that although I have not sent anything out this week,
I have been thinking about you all and writing to you throughout the last
couple of weeks.  When I'm done, I'll send it along.

I feel overwhelmed with love and gratefulness towards each of you this
morning.  Peter is in Albany today and writing you now keeps me with company
even in the quiet.

Bar