• There was no card for me this year
• That compared my eyes to the stars above.
• There was no card for me this year
• That professed undying love.
• And there was no card from me,
• That in turn proclaimed the same.
• For this year my marriage
• Is only my last name.

• It was I who left
• With eye bereft
• Of any falling tear.
• It was I who put the past behind
• In search of my new year.
• I went to him, not because of him.
• I only left for me.
• I sought myself,
• I sought my life,
• My own identity.

• I have been mother, child and wife,
• But have not been what I could be.
• For in the many roles I’ve played,
• I never have been me.

• Now I follow my heart
• And trust my soul
• And begin to sop the healing balm
• And begin to feel the inner peace
• Of raging spirit becalmed.

• Though tears still flow,
• The grief will pass
• My eyes will dry and start to see.
• My heart will mend.
• The pain will end.
• At last, I will know me.

As I sit here tonight and watch the new star that I have found in the heavens, memories collide and I am reminded of a sweaty little palm that held tightly onto my hand, a palm that, too quickly, slipped from my grasp.

That star probably isn’t really a new star, but I am sure that I have never seen it before. It shines brightly and steadily, just to the left of the crescent moon. It shines as if it had a message for me. “Don’t worry,” it says, “No more stops, Mom. I’m home.”

Reason tells me that the words are only memory, but my heart is sure that it recognizes the star. I have been talking to that star for a long time, since the first time I felt it flutter in my swelling belly—

“Okay, little one, just one more stop and we’ll go home and rest,” I said as I walked through the doorway to Sears. Behind me, another customer couldn’t help but chuckle as he inquired, “Do you think he really hears you?”

I laughed, too and replied, “I don’t know if he does or not, but right now, it’s the only way I have to tell him I love him.”

I have loved him for a long time, since the first tiny flutter that told me he was truly there and alive. I think it was only then that I believed he would eventually come into existence. I picked up my order that day, went home and set-up the new bassinet. While I worked, I talked to my baby boy.

I talked to him all that summer as his small body grew and moved inside mine. Then on September 5, 1975, I was struck dumb as I held this miracle of life in my arms for the first time. Soon, though, I found my tongue and continued talking to Lance Quincy Paquette. I talked to him for the next 21 years. Sometime, during that period, I even learned to talk with him. The last time was on March 30, 1997. He called home from Fort Polk, Louisiana that Sunday to ask me how to keep score at Gin Rummy. I treasure that call, knowing that it was just a way to reach out and hear, “I love you, Son,” and reply, “I love you, too, Mom.”

Two days later, I learned that I would talk with him no more. I learned that day about the death of an earthly star and the birth of a heavenly one. The miracle of my son is gone. I see him in one bright star that flutters momentarily in the night just as the spark of his new life fluttered inside me so many years ago.

I talk to the star.

There’s no better way to get rid of the blues than looking at a blue sky! Today is the first day in a week that I woke up to one and it is a very welcome sight.

For the last week, Winona and surrounding towns have been deluged with sheets of rain at least once a day. Over the week-end many areas contended with five to over eleven inches of rain in just a few hours. As a result of the storms, many area homes were completely lost and many area businesses suffered damage that is near irreparable. Last Saturday night Winona was hit with a storm so strong that the rain formed currents of water that literally coursed down the sidewalks and streets of the town.

My friend, Suzanne, missed all the excitement. The day before the storm, Friday, was the day Suzanne finally gave in to the intruder that violated her body and coursed through her internal organs like a torrent of rain. Friday, my friend died of cancer. Although she wasn’t a smoker, her cancer started as a small, microscopic cell in her lungs. It was first detected in her liver and eventually metastasized and sent over a dozen of its wayward children to her brain. Still, Suzanne was a fighter. The medical community gave her just six months to live, but she prevailed through nearly two years of radiation, chemotherapy, and homeopathic treatments… until last Friday.

I didn’t see much of my friend these last few months. Should I have called and disturbed her when she was sleeping or should I have just dropped by, even though she may have been unprepared to receive visitors? At the time the choices were too hard to make so I took the easy way and chose to do nothing. Today I feel guilty as I enjoy the blue sky that Suzanne didn’t get the chance to see.

Today I’m left with enjoying the blue sky and hoping that wherever Suzanne is, she can look down and forgive me. I’m hoping that wherever she is, she is enjoying blue skies today.