Lucky, lucky, lucky you.  Lucky, lucky, lucky you.  My eleven year old son quietly chanted this phrase while glaring at me from his hospital bed.  He was so angry because I was well and he was not.  The memory still pierces my heart.  From his perspective, it was true. When I was eleven, I was out riding bikes and playing with my friends.   But still, who would call me lucky.  What mother would want to watch her child suffer the effects of chemo therapy?  I know of no one who would envy my life.

Sometimes I try to recall my teenage years.  I try to remember the girl, I used to be when I thought that life was just beginning.  I see my younger self, laughing and having a good time. She has a future ahead of her that would include a career, marriage and children (especially children). What would I say to my younger self, if I could?  What would I tell her to do differently?  And what would her reaction be?

I can see her so clearly, walking home from school with her boyfriend, holding hands.  One of the neighbours disapprovingly tells her mother, "they walk so close, no light can pass between them."

"Ashton" was my first boyfriend.  We met when we were sixteen.  I was in grade 11 and he was in grade 12.  He was a year ahead because he was born in England and moved to Canada in his early teens.  Their school system was ahead of ours.

We met in an arcade.  I approached him because I mistakenly thought he was a friend of my friend "David."  We talked and he walked me home.  From then on we started dating regularly. I remember that initially I was not interested in him and I tried to discourage him from liking me but eventually we fell in love. (That sounds corny, even to me but I do believe it is the truth.)

I don't often think of that relationship any more.  In fact, I don't remember much from the two years that Ashton and I were together.  But the pictures I have from that time are of two young people, who look very happy and very close.  I've saved his letters after all these years, and they too reveal a very intimate relationship.  I kept the letters all these years because I thought that one day, I may want to show them to my oldest son.  I want him to know it was a good relationship and not just a "fling."  The pictures and letters are important because they are all he may ever know of his biological father.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,

Wandering from the fold of God;

He, to rescue me from danger, 

Interposed His precious blood;

O to grace how great a debtor

Daily I'm constrained to be!

Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,

Bind my wandering heart to Thee.

Prone to Wander, Lord I feel it,

Prone to leave the God I love;

Here's my heart, O take and seal it,

Seal it for Thy courts above.

Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,

Take my ransomed soul away;

Send thine angels now to carry

Me to realms of endless day.

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/c/o/comethou.htm

I searched for over a year for the perfect words for my tombstone.  When I first heard the words above from the hymn "Come,  Thou Fount of Every Blessing," I knew I had found my epitaph.  This is only a portion of the song which tells my story.  It is my prayer.

My tombstone now sits in the cemetery of my church but these words are not on it.  Looking at it, I can see my future.  You would think the sight of one's final resting place would send shivers down the spine.  At one time, that would have been my reaction but life has a way of changing the way we view things.  "Come my Lord, no longer tarry, Take my ransomed soul away."

Ever hear the bible verse from Matthew 6:21, "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."  It's true.  I have a treasure in heaven and my heart yearns for it.  It's the reason I've developed a fascination with cemeteries.  I can't drive by them without scanning the stones for interesting pictures, shapes or verses.  While I like the older stones, it's the newer ones that interest me.  They tell stories.  People put on symbols and verses that give you a glimpse into the life of the deceased.  It's their last chance to show the world how wonderful their loved one was.  It is where they carve their most intimate expressions of love in stone to ensure their prolonged existence.

I know the feelings behind the monuments.  I stressed over what to put on my stone.  Not because it was mine, but because it was ours.  My husband's, my son's and mine together.