THE OWL AND THE BUTTERFLY

I attended the funeral of my great-grandmother when I was eleven years old. I hated it. No one in my family took time to explain to me what had happened to her, and they forced me to look at her in the casket. "She's in Heaven with Jesus." Somehow that did not comfort me. I refused to attend any funerals for years after that.

In the early 90s, I had this wonderful young friend from Unity. She didn't talk, she "bubbled". Her enthusiasm for life and everyone she met was unparalleled. I was licking my wounds from my recent divorce, and was not getting out much. She visited me often, and talked me into going places when I only wanted to stay home and suffer. When another friend of ours' mother died, I voiced my fears of attending funerals, Terri pooh-poohed me and said, "Come on, Marilyn, we are going to that funeral. Carol needs us." As we started out on our journey to find the country cemetery where the graveside service was being held, suddenly a huge owl swooped down across the road in front of us. So close to the car we could see its feathers; so close we both ducked! It wasn't dark yet, and since I was familiar with Native American spirituality, I told Terri that some tribes considered an owl an omen of death. Again, she reminded me of our destination, and said, "Wel-lll?"

If that had been the only incidence I don't think it would have stood out in my memory as it does. However, on another trip with her on this same road near my country home, it happened again. It must have been the same owl. We looked at each other, and I shivered this time. In the three short years that I knew Terri, she dragged me to three funerals, and then was instrumental in helping me keep myself together when my son's young fiance was killed in an automobile accident. We were all devastated and I moved around like a zombie. Terri was there for me, and took on necessary chores I could not face. She was at the visitation, dressed in black... a black satin jumpsuit... with her halo of natural platinum blond hair hinting at the angel she was for us. She drew the crowd of people -- none of whom she had ever met before -- of so many different backgrounds and beliefs, together with her warm, loving nature. When she talked, you knew that the deceased person was, as she said, (tapping a strange man on the chest) "forever in our hearts". And that someday, in some fashion, we would all be together again.

Four funerals in three years! And then a terrible blow. This bright young mother of two, so full of life and joy and music, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. The months that followed were a blur to me. She was in and out of the hospital, had three operations, bravely stating that she was going to beat this disease. But I could be there for her. After all, she had been preparing me for this all along, although neither of us realized it. At one point in ICU, she turned to me, squeezed my hand, and asked me, "What's going to happen, Marilyn? Am I just going to go to sleep one day and not wake up?" "If that's what you want", I answered. And after she had made all the arrangements with her family and discussed her final wishes with them, I contacted a beloved Unity minister who was out of state at the time and told her Terri wanted her to conduct her service. She said she hoped she could return in time. Days later, after Terri met with Grace, who did make it back to Texas in time, when I arrived at the hospital before going to work the nurse leaving her room told me Terri was no longer with us. She had had her morning bath and said she wished to sleep for a while. She did not wake up from this sleep..

It was a joyous funeral, full of music Terri loved. Terri was a music therapist, and played guitar as well as piano. The chapel was packed to overflowing; the front rows full of the mentally disabled men that Terri helped take care of at the State School. Most of them called her Mama. They clapped and cheered when the minister talked about the happy person we all knew and loved. Terri would have liked that.

And I do carry her in my heart.
Marilyn