Living Life Through Your Heart

I have used, and heard, the phrase "well look at the bright side" more times then I can count.  I took a long five day weekend this week and spent time with my good friend Geo and a couple other buddies who I have not spent much time with in this past year.  I would not really call this particular group of buddies the most energetic boys outside of their sport of hockey, but their minds work a lot like mine in the way we try to see the world.

We like to see the good laid out in the path before us along our journey's.  With most all of my friends I get accused of being "the second coming of Jesus" due to my Christian outlook on life and my involvement with my church.  I love my Lord but I also believe it is not the Christian part of my life that completely makes me who I am.  It is the pieces of my heart and soul that keep my brain in check when it comes to seeing the good in others.  Let me tell you, there is a lot of good out there.  A lot more good than there is bad.  It is human nature that has the population of the world believing there is more bad than there is good. 

I sometimes blog about Life's Beautiful Moments.  Sometimes really is not enough and doesn't capture all the beautiful moments in life that I witness.  I focus on the good in life, perhaps because of the personal tragedies I have faced in the past.  We all have them, and we all handle them very different from each other.  I decided years ago, when I moved from Sioux City IA to Boston MA, that I needed a more refreshing outlook on life.  Not as a means to escape the memories of loved ones gone. Not as a means to forget about the abuse inflicted upon me as a child.  No, it was not to forget my past.  It may have been to forgive the tragic moments of my past, but not to forget them.

Taking a one day road trip this past week with my buddies, Geo, Matty, and Stuey was meant to be just a good old time with the boys.  We did indeed have an excellent time tripping to the Cape.  It is unexplainable to describe the open air freedom feeling of riding a motorcycle with a destination to relaxation so I won't even begin to describe it.  Once we hit our destination we all knew, and looked forward to, just bumming around for the day until we decided it was time to head back to Boston.

We relaxed plenty, mostly on the beach just catching up with what each of us have been doing in our daily lives since we last seen each other.  None of us tried to out do each other in our lives walk since college.  I work in a bookstore, one of the guys plays hockey, one of the guys helps others invest their money, one of them helps business's grow through advertising on the web.  We all down played what we do for a living, caring only that we were all doing ok and less about who made more money.  Our conversation turned to our happiness, our personal lives beyond a paycheck.  Geo had broken up with his girlfriend of three years.  Matty was finally engaged to his girlfriend after eight years of serious dating.  Stuey was causal dating, as he has been since we first met.  I was still seeing Kristy, the girl I have been seeing since my sophomore year of high school.  No more details were needed, because we are guys, and direct answers satisfy our direct questions.

Conversations were light and airy, nothing made us churn our brains very hard.  Silence was comfortable among us friends.  The fresh air felt refreshing, the beauty of life a site to see.  All at once the four of us turned our direction to the sounds of laughter coming from about 20 feet away to our left.  We watched as a family of four, a mom and a dad with their small children (guessing at ages 3 and 5) played some catch with a nerf ball.  The kids just yucking it up, laughing at dad who could not catch the ball before it hit him in the face, or on the arm, or landed just beyond his reach.  All smiles, all enjoying their day together as a family.  I told my buddies "look at that, that is one of life's beautiful moments."

Being ribbed about my statement of "Life's Beautiful Moments" and explaining to the guys that you can look at life from two different angles, you can see that family bonding 20 feet away and enjoy the happiness they bring to each other, or you can look another 10 feet beyond them and see the young couple arguing over something that is probably so meaningless it will ruin their day.  And thus begin our quest for people watching the rest of day, pointing out Life's Beautiful Moments.

The young woman who stopped in front of a young child crying and offering her a hug.  The middle aged man who took out a dollar from his wallet to cover the 49 cents the old man in front of him was short on his debt.  The old woman sitting on the bench waiting for the bus who smiled big when a teenage boy sat next to her just to offer her a hello.  The mom who stopped, picked up some litter and threw it in the trash can, no dout explaining to her two young children what she was doing, and why she did it.  Time after time there beautiful life moments one or more of us witnessed and pointed out.  It seemed one right after another, acts of kindness creating beautiful moments that so many people over look, were occurring.

Our day was full of looking on the bright side of life from the moment we hit the beach to the moment we rounded the corner and turned into my neighborhood, riding up to the driveway of my house.  As we stopped and got off our bikes we heard laughter.  We all turned our attention to the second house east of my house.  My nieces were on the front porch of our neighbors, giggling at Mr. Mark, who was entertaining them by wearing one of their play tiara's, pretending he too was a princess.

What I didn't explain to my buddies that day was how I came to see more of life's beautiful moments and less of the tragedies.  You see, beautiful moments come from the heart. Whether you are making them or witnessing them, it is done through the heart.  They are not something you have to think about to feel, give, or receive.  Everyone of them is just a heart beat away.  When you think about life with your brain it is wired by human nature, which wants us to witness the bad times and dwell on what isn't.  When you feel life through your heart it is wired by God, and He wants us to be good, do good, see good, feel good.  He wants us to look at life as it is designed to be.  Full of goodness, kindness, love.  Take the tragedies you face in your journey on earth and find the beauty it has left behind you.

As you walk through life you will find that there are both good and evil.  Hand in hand along your journey in life you will witness both of life's ugly moments and life's beautiful moments.  When you feel despair in your life I hope you realize you are using your brain to take each step when in fact you should be using your heart.  It is something I have trained myself to do and although I still run into moments of pure hatred, there are by far more beautiful moments that I witness. 

My little angel in heaven, Amazing Gracie, taught me how big our hearts really are.  She told me on several occasions that our hearts are capable of holding more love then we can ever imagine.  Gracie told me that while the brain is looked at as the organ most under used at 10%, it is the heart really, that is never used to it's full capacity.  That we will only ever be capable of achieving 100% of the use of our brain even though we rarely use over 10% of it.  However, the heart is not capable of filling up with all the love we think it can.  We will never use 100% of our heart because when it hits 100% there is always more love to shove inside of it.

"It's like how when you eat so much food that your tummy is so full you can not even take one more bite.  But your daddy says 'hey lets go get an ice cream treat' and you know you can fit all that yummy in your full tummy.  So you just eat ice cream and it melts on its way down and fits into all those spaces between the food you just thought filled you all up."

Yes, Amazing Gracie, you are correct.  Fill your heart up with so much love from so many different people and never be afraid to add more love.  Perhaps that is what the saying "melts my heart" is about after all.  You will find that in life there will be moments that break your heart.  You will also find that if you allow yourself to love just a little more, even if you think you cannot love any more, that love will seep into the cracks of the times your heart was broken and fill up with more love then you thought it was capable of holding.

Life's Beautiful Moments comes from living through your heart.  I encourage you to work on unlocking that life, and train yourself to live life to its fullest through the that organ and give your mind a rest.  Use your brain as a means of financial gain, use your heart as a means of happiness.  Allow yourself the rewards that come from filling up your heart with more love then you ever though possible.  Go ahead, try and prove Gracie wrong by trying to fill your heart full until it holds no more love.  I double dog dare you. 

Yes, I Count The Days



 

It's been 107 days since the earth lost little Lars when at the age of eight he went Beyond A Breath Of Life to live an eternal life with God.  It has been 107 days since someone I am close to has died.  It has been 107 days since I attended a wake, a funeral, a death meal.  It has been 107 days since I said good bye to someone's soul as it soared up to the heavens.  One hundred and seven days.

Today marks the one year anniversary of the death of my friend Ce'dric.  Three hundred and sixty five days since he went Beyond A Breath Of Life (.click here to read Ce'dric's final days)  Yes, I count the days behind me as they move forward without those I love next to me on earth.

I could not be in Boston today as Ce'dric's family celebrates the anniversary of his death.  Business travel has taken me to the other side of the United States.  I say celebrate because I sat with Ce'dric's dad, (George) and his two younger brothers (Adrian and Avery) a couple of weeks ago as they reflected on the upcoming anniversary of his death.

The anger for them is gone, they have come to accept that Ce'dric taking his own life was not about his love for them.  It is difficult to comprehend how his love for them was not strong enough to keep him amongst the living, but his love for his soul mate Alana was strong enough for him to want to die.  (Alana herself had died a few months earlier). 

The fear for them is gone.  They no longer fear what tomorrow brings.  They have worked through this fear for the entire year as time moved forward.  While they want their son/brother back with them they no longer feel the fear they first experienced when Ce'dric left them on that day that will always seem like just yesterday. 

They will forever miss him, but they no longer will mourn the life they will never have back with them until they themselves reach eternal life.  They will now focus on the memories of when he was alive.  The good times always out weighed the bad times.  Ce'dric was an awesome brother, they would tell you.  Ce'dric was our best friend they say.  Ce'dric is happy now.

I have spent a year now with the family Ce'dric left behind to grieve and mourn his untimely death.  I have interacted with his family on many levels.  We have attended mass together, we have celebrated holidays together, we have golfed, played soccer, played hockey, played football.  In a years time we have shared anger, tears, confusion.  We have searched for answers in our hearts, in our souls, in our minds.  We have talked about the why's? The how's? The reasons? The blame.  We have shared stories of our time spent with Ce'dric.  We have fought through feelings of lonesomeness, worthiness, sadness.  We have become one in our sadness and our grief. 

I year ago today I was shocked and stunned to learn about the death of my friend Ce'dric.  I have faced death so many times on so many different levels but for some reason Ce'dric death brought forth an anger I had never experienced.  I had a need to understand how he could leave behind two brothers who he meant the world to.  Two brothers he loved so much and spent so much time with.  I found a way to deal with that anger without realizing that was what I was doing.  I took on the role of big brother to them, spending time with them on an almost weekly basis.  While I knew I could never replace the role Ce'dric was in their lives, I knew I could continue to set an example for them in their daily lives to be the best they could be. 

What the three of us ended up doing was helping each other through a tragic event.  An event that effected us all in the same way, but with different degree's of grief.  I was not just there to support and help them, they also became two little guys who supported and helped me.  Our bond is as strong as a brotherhood could be.  No blood line was needed to think of each other as family.  Last week when I picked up Avery to go take some photo shots of life in the city of Boston we visited Ce'dric at the location of his death.  We sat against a tree near his final resting place and talked about the life now gone. 

Avery made the statement "If Ce'dric hadn't died we would never be close like this.  I wonder if he knew what he was doing."  That statement has never been far from my thoughts.  It has me reflecting on all the tragic moments in my life, as well as all the good ones.  Had one thing not happened, the next may never of come along.  Had my brother Joey never died, I may have never even met Ce'dric which means I would never have met his two younger brothers which means I would never have two more people in my life to help me grow. 

"IT IS WHAT IT IS" was Ce'dric phrase.  Through the good times and the bad times in his life, he always lived by that saying.  All but one.  Alana's death, the love of his life, would prove that not always is it "what it is".  Someday we will all find that one moment in life where we will not longer be able to live by that phrase, but until then, there is life to be lived, there are people to be loved.  There are pictures to be taken, there are games to be played.  Songs to be sung. Prayers to be prayed.

It has been 2693 days since my brother Joey died. (click here to read my first blog ever)

 

Uncle Joey's Spirit Birthday Party

My brother Joey, who died in 2007 at the age of 24 from complications of lung cancer, would have turned 32 yesterday.  Each day that passes since he left earth takes me no further from the pain I felt on the day he breathed his last breath.  The comfort I find to help me ease the pain is that as each day passes I am one more day closer to the day I will see him again.  It is difficult to not be mad at God for plucking Joey from us and planting him in God's Eternal Life plan.  What helps me find comfort in God's plan for Joey to be taken from my physical world so soon, and just when I needed him the most, is that God's plan for all of us is that we will be reunited once again as each of us is called home to God. 


If I was taken Beyond A Breath Of Life at this moment I would be reunited with my mom, my brother Jayson, my brother Joey, my baby sister Jacelyn, not to mention many people I have met along my walk on earth, Gracie and several others who have touched my life since Joey died.  I also would have to leave behind my only living sibling Jordy and his family, not to mention the Misfit family that I am a part of, the non-blood related family that I have bonded with and consider one of my greatest treasures in life.  It's easy to consider yourself stuck between here and there when you want to be in both places for the same reason.  That reason is because you love them all equally and would miss them all so dearly no matter what side of the clouds you are on. 


Keeping the memory of Joey alive in my heart has never been a challenging thing for me to do.  The date of his death and the date of his birth are important to me and I would like them to be important to everyone whose life was touched in one way or another by Joey.  I have many fears in my life, most are just ridiculous and annoying to me, but they are things I need to work through as each moment in my life passes by.  One of my greatest fears is that people will forget who Joey was to me. That in time they will no longer remember the date of his birth, or the date he took his last breath.  Those dates and all the memories will never fade from my heart.  I have four journals I have written in since Joey's death that are full of memories of the times we shared while we both took breaths from the same pocket of air in our little hometown city of Sioux City IA.  Each time I log another memory of the times I spent with my brother Joey its as if he has never left me.


Yesterday I received a lot of nice texts and emails from members of my Misfit family, my parents siblings and some of my closest friends.  All of them shooting little reminders my way of just how much I mean to them, or how much Joey meant to them.  It made my day bitter sweet to hear from so many of those that know how much Joey means to me.  I was also pleasantly surprised to hear from so many of my blog followers, who without me publishing a blog yesterday, remembered it was the day of Joey's birth.  It more deeply confirms my faith in human nature and the kindness so graciously given to each other, for no more personal gain then knowing they have touched a soul in a remarkable way.  At the end of my work day I was full of so much gratitude for having such great people in my life.  But it was not over yet.


I had barely gotten into my house and changed out of my work clothes when my phone rang.  I knew that ring, it was my brother Jordy's wife calling.  I had programed "Spoonful of Sugar" from Mary Poppins to ring out when Brooke's cell phone was calling me.  When her number was calling me it was usually my 3 1/2 year old niece Olivia calling for something.  The reason I selected that song is because whenever I asked Olivia 'who do you think you are?' she would respond to me with "Well I'm just a spoonful of sugar Uncle Jett".  My brother and his family live next door to me and if Olivia is not waiting on the porch for me when I get home from work, she is calling me.  If I do not answer, she is at the door with in seconds demanding an explanation as to why I did not answer my phone. 


When I picked up the call, sure enough, Olivia was on the other end.  "Uncle Jett come over to my house right now. It's an urgency (emergency, but she's only 3 1/2) and we are waiting for you."  Of course I made my way next door, going out our back door, down our deck, across to the fence with the gate built just for the sole purpose of my little nieces being able to come over without having to leave the safety of their back yard to get to our house.  Olivia in fact has come to call our backyard her backyard.  When her mom would stand on their deck and yell out "girls where are you?" you would often hear Olivia yell out "in my other yard mommy".  Just like my house was her 'other house' and my bedroom was her 'other bedroom', her 'other kitchen', her other everything. 


Heading through that gate I could look up and see two little noses and four little hands pressing against their back door waiting for me to get there.  I was certain of two things as I climbed the stairs up onto their deck.  One, Jaci would scream and run way from the door and two, Olivia would stand there looking at me and say, "you have to knock to get in here".  Partly because she liked to be able to unlock the door and partly because she likes to drive me insane by being in control of my movements.  So I knocked and so she unlocked the door and invited me in.  And thus began the most touching moment of my day, one I surely had no idea would fill my being with so much love, so much happiness, on a day that meant the world to me already.


I walked into a kitchen decorated for a birthday party.  I was given a pointed party hat to wear.  There were cupcakes on the table, each one with a letter on it.  There was a J, an O, an E, and a Y.  There were party horns by each place setting.  Balloons tied to the back of each chair, held up in the air with helium. Each balloon held a message.  The blue one said "love", the red one said "faith", the yellow one said "hope" and the green one said "happy birthday".  The plates and napkins had balloons and ribbons printed on them, the same colors as the balloons tied to the chairs.  There was a scoop of orange sherbert ice cream on each plate.  A gift sat in the middle of the table in a gift bag that was decorated with big lazy flowers with a tag hanging from it with 'Uncle Joey' written on it in the hand writing of a niece he never met.


Jaci had already climbed up onto her chair, Olivia was working her way up on hers.  I sat down in a chair between them.  My eyes were teary.  There was a sadness in my heart as I looked across the table at the empty chair.  The chair that was for Joey, where his soul was in the absence of his physical being.  I looked around the table and thought how well it was put together to honor the uncle these two little girls would meet one day, far away, in God's house.  His favorite color, green, held the message of a happy birthday.  His favorite ice cream, orange sherbert, scooped on a plate as if he would get to enjoy its taste.  I could picture him sitting across from me in the chair wearing a pointy party hat on top of his head full of curls.  As tears began to drop from my eyes I felt two little hands, one to my right and one to my left, latch on to my hands.  We shared a moment of silence, perhaps planned perhaps not.  A moment I took to thank God for the blessing in my life in the form of two little girls, one who I knew did not understand the meaning of this party, the other who I knew convinced her mommy to help her plan it.


In the background, coming from a room outside of the one we were sitting in, came music.  It told me that my sister in law Brooke was near, participating in this party but letting the girls and I play it out by ourselves.  The music playing was Cherub Rock by Smashing Pumpkins.  Joey's absolute favorite song by them.  My attention was brought back to the party being thrown for Joey by Olivia starting to sing Happy Birthday.  I joined in and Jaci did the best she could to keep up with our rendition.  When we were done singing Jaci picked up her spoon "ice cweam" she said with a smile as big as her heart.  The three of us sat there, four if you counted the spirit of the birthday boy, eating and talking and laughing.  The girls laughed as a I told them how much their daddy looks like Uncle Joey.  That Uncle Joey was even thinner than their daddy.  That Uncle Joey had the curliest hair ever.  That Uncle Joey was even taller than I was.  That when Jaci smiled, she looked just like how Uncle Joey smiled.  That Uncle Joey's eyes were even bluer than Olivia's eyes were. 


Olivia stood on her chair, which prompted Jaci to do the same.  "Uncle Jett", she said, "you can open up the gift from Uncle Joey."  For Joey I corrected her, it is not from Joey, it is for Joey.  I picked up the bag and as I took out its contents I understood she was correct.  These gifts were for the three of us as if Joey himself left them there for us.  Three picture frames.  Silver.  One read BEST BROTHER, one read GREATEST UNCLE, the last read UNCLE GREATNESS.  All three of those silver frames that were etched with black ink describing there meanings held a picture of Joey.  Olivia handed them out to each of us as she saw fit.  We all thanked Joey for being such a big part of our lives and let him know we love him.  I told the girls they gave Uncle Joey a lovely party and I am sure as his spirit sat with us he was smiling at us and proud of his little nieces. 


The girls ran off to play as I sat at that table taking it all in.  Brooke came in the kitchen and sat with me for a moment.  "You're a great Uncle Jett, and a great brother.  The girls are lucky to have you in their lives to help them get to know Joey."  I was speechless and touched.  I stood up and received the tightest hug ever from one of the most thoughtful, wonderful people in the world.  I thanked her for such a thoughtful sign of her love for our family and for not letting the memory of Joey fade from their lives.  "I didn't do any of this Jett," she said, "it was Jordy who helped the girls. It was his idea."


I was emotionally exhausted from this spirit birthday party.  I loved it!  It meant a lot to me to spend this hour with the girls and celebrate a life they never knew, an uncle they never met.  To hear that my brother had planned this was overwhelming.  He was not one to dwell on the deaths of our loved ones like I do.  We did not spend a lot of time talking about how we missed them.  I had come to understand that everyone grieves differently and him and I would never experience what they other felt when it came to the lost of our brother Joey.  Emotionally, I just need to get through that gate that doesn't really separate my house from my brothers house.  I need to just lay back and let the memory of this day etch itself in my heart. 


As I walked out that door that Olivia let me in an hour earlier I seen my only living sibling, my only living brother, Jordy, sitting on his deck.  The chair pulled back against his house near the door where he no doubt had been enjoying the celebration he organized so my nieces and I could bond with Joey's spirit on the day he would have turned 32.  Neither one of us attempted to avoid eye contact.  As I looked him in the eye I knew he would see in me what I was seeing in him.  Our eyes were filled with tears, our hearts were filled with a bitter sweetness.  He leaned back against his house with his head up towards the sky and closed his eyes.  I stepped down from the deck and headed through the gate back into my own yard.  Not a word was spoken, it didn't need to be.  We let each other be in our own grief for the loss of a brother seven years ago.  We appreciated the sadness we shared but never spoke of.  We understood the pain that resides inside our hearts, next to the love we had for our brother. 


I sat my framed picture of my brother Joey on my dresser.  He was tall, and skinny and his hair was curly.  He protected me when he was alive from the scariness of my life in the Bushnell house.  I thought about Jordy. He was tall, and he was skinny and although his hair was not curly, he protects me from the scariness of my life away from the Bushnell house.  Jordy means as much to me as Joey did, and yesterday I found out that I mean as much to him as Joey did.  I am blessed, not just because of a birthday party that celebrated the spirit of a loved one gone, but because I get to celebrate each day with the love of a loved one NOT gone.