Kara's Story

I am on a train headed North to see my family for our annual summer “camp.”  My brother and sister and their children will be gathered around my father’s home on the lake where we laugh, challenge each other to every sport imaginable and we reconnect as a family.

This event is a complete reflection of everything my father believed in when we were growing up and that he still believes in today. He shines in his “role” of healthy, vibrant Dad.   It is the week our family is truly at its best.

Less than 36 hours ago I was in Europe on a personal journey of healing and growth. It was intense, brilliant and overwhelming.  I was still integrating the experience in the morning as I took the subway to the train station.  And I know I will still be integrating it for months to come.  But no time for that now, I had to get to camp. 

My return flight was delayed.  Exhausted, I needed a day to rest and recharge: I knew that was the right thing to do.   But I did not know that would now leave me with just one dinner and a breakfast with my entire family as their plans had changed as well.  My siblings and their children now had to leave the morning after I arrived.   I was upset.  I had such expectations for this gathering.  This might be the last time we would all be together.  And I had plans to make it perfect. 

My expectations for the week had been so high and now they felt so small.  As I sat on the Amtrak train, which was moving North at a brisk pace, I let the memories of previous “summer family camps” move through me.  Next and following close behind were all the emotions: disappointment, sadness, loss, abandonment.   I looked each one in the eye, named it and let it travel through.  I used my breath to propel each emotion on, grateful that I had learned how to do this and grateful for the long train ride that gave me the stillness and the time.  And most of all I was grateful for the window seat that gave me the view of nature that passed by and reassured my soul.  Intuition told me the wise choice was to let this happen. 

Two hours later, with no judgment interrupting this process, I knew I was done.  I felt free.   

Photo by Mihai Surdu

I sat in the stillness, shut my eyes and asked my breath to pick up a flashlight and look around deep inside me.  I instructed my breath to make sure, at least for now, it was all gone. 

Intuition is the chariot of wisdom.  It has always guided me to the best answers. My job was to be clear and allow the voice of intuition to be heard.  In the last hour of the train ride, I heard the answer. 

“Your father needs to talk with you to share with you.  If the others were there, he could not.  You are the one he knows he can talk to about his death.”

I got off the train and joyfully embraced the changes of the trip.

My need to have it a certain, “perfect” way now happily morphed into this new perfect way.  Had I stayed in the feelings of “upset or disappointment” I might have missed this opportunity.

Dinner that night was familiar territory. Lots of conversation about what everyone had been doing on the lake all week: new records set on water skis, badminton, and archery. The children competed loudly to fill me in on every adventure with a firefly or a fish.  As they did, I glanced down the table and saw my father’s face.   It touched me so deeply I gasped.  Luckily the gasp was lost in the cacophony of joyful little voices.

In years passed, this very same conversation would have evoked a look of pride in my father and his words would have been full of opinions and advice on how we could do it better next time.   But this face was softer and far away.  It was as if he wasn’t sitting at the table with us but instead he was watching through a pane of smoky glass.  I could feel he was imagining the table, this conversation in the future without him there.  

It wasn’t that he was sad but he seemed resigned, accepting of where his life had led him in these final days, or months, of pulling back of goodbyes.  

The next day before my cup of coffee was near the end, cars were packed up, hugs and promises to visit again soon were given and then they were all gone. My stepmother followed the cars to the end of the dirt road, waving and blowing kisses. 

Dad and I were left just standing there.  Two adults both questioning their lives and what we wanted to do with the time we each had left.  Funny how we don’t realize the preciousness of life until someone we love comes up against their death.

For the rest of the day the conversation flowed from God to death, to fear, to letting go, to service while here on earth, and always back to love.  

As the daylight was ending, I asked my Dad if he would like to walk down to the lake and watch the sunset.  He did.  

We sat in the old Adirondack chairs that waited for us at the lake’s edge.  The chairs threatening to fall apart any day now as the dried out wood had pulled away from the nails that once held them together.   I wanted to reach over and take my father’s hand but I didn’t.   I felt his fragility of spirit, which he courageously let rise to the surface with me, might be interrupted if I did. 

We watched the diminishing glow of the sun reflecting itself in the lake.  I suspected my Dad had been watching the contrast of his life’s diminishing glow reflected back at him in the vibrant faces of his children and grandchildren at dinner last night. 

Staring straight ahead into the sunset, I said, “Dad, every time I see a sunset I will think of you.”

Silence.

Then more silence.

Then in a whisper he said, “Can you also think of me when you see a sunrise?”

I took the chance, and reached for his hand.  

“Yes, I will. “