In this spring season of graduations my husband and I are just back from what we called our “memory lane” motor tour–12 hours driving time each way to Springfield MO. for our granddaughter Vitoria’s graduation with a PhD in Physical Therapy. Turns out there were lots of meaningful places along the way to stop and reminisce; the Ohio State University campus in Columbus where my husband spent four years getting his undergrad degree, the now “historical street” Bardstown Road in Louisville Ky where I learn the elementary school I attended still stands, along with the church where I spent half my life during high school, teaching and taking dance classes in their gymnasium.
Driving back after all the festivities I was in afterglow, so grateful to be there to witness this milestone in my granddaughter’s life, this milestone in our family’s life. There had been a heightened sense of joy and excitement in the weeks leading up to this occasion, and now along with joy and gratitude tears come to my eyes. Given the back story to this occasion, for the elders in the group, the experience is heightened. We knew this happiest of occasions would bring with it the sorrow of missing a significant person not able to be in attendance.
Tori’s mother, our daughter Corinne was a physical therapist who loved her work and, who died of Breast Cancer when Tori was 7 years old. Tori remembers visiting her mother at her work and she admits this may have influenced her to look towards that field for her own career. She had not been aware of the conversation I had with Corinne when I accompanied her to M.D. Anderson for her treatment. “When all this cancer stuff is over, I’m gonna get my PhD.”
Fortunately, we know that you can feel more than one feeling at a time, feelings that on the surface might seem opposite to one another. Catching up with Tori and her two brothers, learning more about their lives, and getting to know the mature adult people they are becoming heightens again the deepest appreciation for their father who has raised them by himself for the past 19 years. If I search for the name of what I am feeling, as I sometimes stand outside myself, moving about in extreme happiness and sorrow, I know it to be ecstasy. Without the side effects of the drug by that name, it is an altered state made possible by the extremes sometimes present in a grieving situation.
In preparing for this celebration, we looked for a way to bring Tori’s mother into the experience, to give her a place of honor. I looked to an art, the art of jewelry making and consulted a neighborhood jewelry store. Their daughter had a laser process that could inscribe the symbol for the Doctor of PT on one side, and a photographic image of Tori’s mother on the other. Moist eyes made their presence during the collaboration in the store, again when I picked the necklace up, and again when we gave it to her at the family dinner. When she wore it to her graduation and the luncheon afterwards, smiles and tears were present again. An image lasered into my memory is of the necklace lying on the kitchen table the next day, beside the flowers that had been a gift from friends. Turned over on its side to the view of Corinne’s picture, she was there in the rented condo for us all to see.
