Summer Theme

This has been the summer for themes. I cannot help myself, I am a thematic person. It doesn't matter if I was hosting a birthday party for my girls or family members, decorating the girls' rooms, teaching a lesson to my students, hosting a staff meeting, giving gifts, or just hosting a family dinner, themes are part of who I am. I love them! I gravitate toward them, so it should have come as no surprise this summer, when my sister was planning a one year memorial celebration for her husband, Michael, that my mind went toward themed items to send, or bring, along. I never asked her what she was planning specifically, but lo and behold, we both had the same "theme" in mind, pink and green lanterns, white, pink and of course, green balloons, flamingo type decorations and plates, because, naturally, there was a story attached to them! So, pink and green it was...and a new theme came to light, No One Fights Alone. How appropriate to find these words on the choosehope.com website, so koozies were ordered, and on an on, we found our way to a pink and green summer.

Karen's picnic table had pinks and greens among the other colors, painted by a neighborhood, as she says. As friends and family gathered around, colors and designs emerged, words surfaced, providing love and inspiration. This table became the focal point of conversation. Prior to the memorial weekend, every store she went through, as did I back in St. Louis, held items of pink and green, green and pink, Allison and Michael, Michael and Allison. One with the other, as we have discovered, it should be...and what was really Michael's one year anniversary into heaven, became yet another honoring of this angel of ours that left us all too soon.

The honoring came on Allison Road. The story sweet and simple. And timely. Perhaps to be shared more in depth at another time, the gathering of loved ones, and scattering of ashes occurred on Allison Road. Matt spoke so beautifully of how Allison gave his father so much strength to persevere and fight. Joseph played the guitar with a quiet voice of "Blue Skies" on the bench as we filed by, one by one, with our own thoughts and memories. A family friend spoke so humorously and yet, seriously, of Michael and the year since he left us. All so beautiful, and all so much than one heart can almost hold. The details will come, but right now, our hearts are filled with pink and green, green and pink.

The koozies came to mind one day when I was perusing the Choose Hope website. The colors struck me at first, because lo and behold, that day, they were featured on the front in yes, pink and green. Then the words...NO ONE FIGHTS ALONE. Visions of "fighting" came to mind, fighting to live, to breathe, to walk, to talk, to attend, to BE, to sleep, to wake-up, to take the drugs, to endure the transplant, fighting to find faith and hope and love and GOD in all of this...our loved ones fought, but they didn't fight alone. We fought with them, each one of us, sister to sister, sons to father, wife to husband, mother to daughter, father to daughter, uncles and aunts to niece, and on and on. NO ONE FIGHTS ALONE. We hope, anyway. We know our loved ones didn't fight alone. We fought. We still fight. And we always will.

The summer theme will go on and on, I suspect. It will be pink and green for eternity. We will find our own way to bring the brightness of those beautiful colors to our existing world. We will remember the sunset we prayed so hard to receive, we will stand in awe at God's wonderment, knowing we received more than we ever hoped for...we asked for beauty and we got so much more. We received, in that indescribable sunset, the sweet assurance that all is well in their world, and we will hold onto that in ours. We will find the shades of pink and greens and we will know, we will just know, it's more than a theme. It is as they want us to be, happy in our pinks, and in our greens, in our sunrises and our sunsets. We will try. And we will not fight alone.