Smiling From Greer To Greer!

smile!, a photo by seanbjack on Flickr.

When I was a child back in Toronto, I inherited my Father's crooked teeth and my Mother soft teeth . . . soft, crooked teeth. I had to have lots of fillings.

My dentist was Dr. Greer on Eglinton Avenue by the Theater and you had to climb a l-o-n-g flight of stairs to get up to his office.

Dr. Greer's main eccentricity was having me memorize bible verses . . . which actually may not have been a bad thing.

Dr. Greer's two elder daughters baby sat me and one of them became a dentist who practiced up in Muskoka (cottage country).

One of the younger children, about my age also became a dentist: Dr. Bill Greer.

When I came to Texas, I found a wonderful and kind dentist, named Dr. Ralph Rose who by then had more than his work cut out for him. About 25 years ago, a fall had caused me to lose several front teeth and Dr. Rose was able to make something permanent for me that has worked very well.

At Christmas this year, I started to have some terrible pain and when he came back from his Colorado vacation, Dr. Rose came into his office to assess just what had gone wrong.

Long story short, tooth roots go up into the sinus area.

Further long story short, Dr. Rose sent me to a dentist who specializes in fixing this.

His name . . . Dr. Bill Greer! No relation: from East Texas, but still what a coincidence.

Dr. Greer has a staff who have been with him a long time and I found myself very comfortable.

So, I was there today for what we hope will be my final surgery and it is still swollen.

But you know - for 1,600 miles from Toronto, I thought that was a pretty good coincidence!

Facebook Page For Aiden (80) - Have You LIKED it?

Rainbow, a photo by Earl Reinink on Flickr.

A few weeks ago, a college student who sings with me in our church choir asked me to add a 6-year-old boy named Aiden (nick-named "80") to the Prayer Journal that Hubby and I keep. This Saturday, she went to be tested to be a Bone Marrow Donor for this same boy at a gathering near us. There will be more chances to be tested to donate.  Aiden's Mother is a friend of another of my friends from church, worked with her and lived in the next town.

There is a very nice Facebook Page for Aiden. ONE LOVE FOR 80. 

Today, 80 is asking his Mother how many people are following his page. 

TODAY, I POSTED THIS ON MY SITE. PLEASE READ THIS WHETHER YOU ARE ON FACEBOOK OR NOT. (BET YOU ARE!)

HELLO TO MY FB FRIENDS FROM CANADA, UNITED STATES, LATIN AMERICA - DOG FRIENDS, ALL FRIENDS!

Since I have FB Friends in many different places, please take time to read about this little boy here in Texas (whose mother is from the next town). 80 is asking how many friends he has on his page and myself, I have been wondering why it has not grown more. 80 will not only steal your heart with his wisdom well beyond his years . . . you will definitely fall in love with him.

ONE LOVE FOR 80 is a Facebook Page for a boy named Aiden (nicknamed 80) who is six years old and in need of a Bone Marrow donor. I hope I have this correct. We have him in our prayer journal and have been praying for him every day.

Let's see how MUCH love we can summon up for this child. . . and May God Bless You!

Why Is Death So Sad?

Nativity Angel, a photo by traqair57 on Flickr.

In the past year we have lost my stepson and my husband's dear friend.

These are fresh and we are still hurting.

Seems like I have "lived" with death ever since I was a little girl and my Aunt Josie and then Uncle Lorne died. My Mother was especially sad and children take quite a lot from the adults around them.

Death is not a happy time; that is a given. But how many times is someone so very sick that you really cannot wish them to keep on living in this state of illness.

I am pretty ordinary - I am probably a lot like you and all your friends. But you know, today I was talking to my sister-in-law - a great gal who I dearly love and she was talking about someone dying.

Out of the blue (as we humans say), I said,

"You know, if we really are Christians - like we say we are - why does death make us so sad?"

(I had two children who died - you already know this - but even though they seemed to never have even had a chance, I cannot wish them to be alive because they were both very unwell children.)

My husband's friend was sick for a month and we visited him and saw for ourselves how truly sick he was. I cannot wish that man be alive and be so sick. So we think about the good times and we try to help his family to adapt to life without him.

When someone is suffering and perhaps cannot recognize everyone; when he cannot enjoy chatting to friends; when he (or she) cannot go to church; eat dinner with friends; chat with loved ones; hold their spouse in their arms . . . should we really wish they would continue in this world?

So, perhaps if we are honest with ourselves, the real difficulty is that now we must live - go on, as it were - without that person. 

At the bottom, I have placed some verses we all have heard many times. I hope it helps us to understand what we (as Christians) have always known.

We who are left behind must adapt to different lives - lives without the loved one who has gone. But we should not be afraid - either for our loved ones or for ourselves. We have learned since we were children, that Our Heavenly Father has prepared a place for us that will be like none other.

May God bless you and may God bless all who have lost loved ones and help us to continue here on earth until our time has come. While we are here, we can help others to adapt to their loses.

But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” - Matthew 19:14.

“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also." - John 14:1 - 3.

But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.” 2 Samuel 12:23

So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.  2 Corinthians 5:6-8 

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. Psalm 23:4

Cemeteries . . . Memorials . . . Death

This week it was 42 years since my daughter, Carrie Jane, went to be with Jesus. Her final resting place is at the head of the grave of my father who died on my 22nd birthday. I miss being able to drive through this very special cemetery where I used to go to church with my grandmother. St. Phillips is a beautiful old Anglican (Church of England - Protestant) Church in Weston, Ontario in West Toronto. The graveyard is remarkable because there are so many interesting tombstones and the front, where my family's tombstone faces is on a busy street.

When my father was so very sick, he told my mother he wanted to be buried at St.Phillips - not "Wind Blown Acres". This was a reference to a beautiful cemetery at Alliston, Ontario where my mother's family was buried. When she was very young, her family used to take a picnic lunch to eat there after church on Sunday. It wasn't far from where she was raised on a farm in Innisfil (Barrie), Ontario, Canada. But her parents died within 6 weeks of each other when she was 14 and she moved to Toronto where she lived with her brother and sister-in-law. 

Mother was the youngest. Her father was married to Carrie and they had three children: two boys and a girl who died at about age 8. His wife, Carrie died in the dentist chair. (I have to assume that this accounts for my inborn fear of dental work. Hearing about that so many times would do that!) He then married her sister, Abigail and they together had two boys and a girl, my mother. Yes, that makes me the youngest of the youngest.

This past week, my husband's good friend also died. We had been to see Bill several times while he was in hospital and he was so very sick . . . 

There are some differences in visitations and funerals here in Texas. Some of it might be the time/generation and some of it would be Texan as compared to Canadian. (I know, I know, but you see the commercial all the time that Texas is a "Whole Other Country".)

We used to have more visitation time and less funerals were held in churches in Toronto. 

I want to tell you that the blog I posted over a year ago on The Funeral That Was a Gift still gets the most readers to this site. That funeral (or more precisely memorial) was the most joyous. That man knew he was dying and he gave all of us who attended the wonderful gift of his music.

Probably because I have had so many people die - or maybe because I am getting old - hard to say, but I am always interested in just how a funeral comes together. 

The biggest visitation I have probably seen was the one for my father-in-law, J.D. (Dee) Sutton who died - in his recliner, devotion bible in his hand - at age 94, less than a year into my marriage to Keith. Pretty much everyone in Robinson, Illinois came that night and we shook hands with so many people with so many fond memories of the man everyone in that town knew. 

The saddest funeral was for my Carrie Jane. It was a tiny white casket like the one described for the victims of Sandy Hook Elementary. It was February cold and only the very best of friends and relatives were there. I still think about that being one of the grimmest days in their lives as well as mine. (Carrie Jane was seven and a half months. She had been born microcephalic which means her brain stopped growing very early in the pregnancy. She was my second microcephalic child. The doctor telling me that no family has two children afflicted this way did not take away the pain.)

I once saw comedian and all-round humanitarian, Bill Cosby at the then O'Keefe Theater in Toronto. He did his irreverent stand-up of how he would have a recording in his casket, saying, "Don't I look nice?" Bill Cosby may be responsible - more than he knows - for cremations and closed caskets. 

In Toronto, we had Jewish neighbours and my Father had many Jewish friends from business. You may know that Jewish people bury before the next sundown. I suspect that is why they never came up to the casket, so the family had to go down to greet them and thank them for their condolences.

Funerals tend to teach you about people. We learn that most people are very glad that others would come to support them, give them a hug and say how sorry they are. We know that some people stay away - probably because of their fears about their own mortality. We learn that in our worst hour, some very fine people "step up to the plate" to help in whatever way they can.

Some bake cookies and cakes; some bring whole meals; some help with a eulogy, bearing the casket. Some people just show up. They don't have to be asked. Some come to give a hug and just exit the side door. 

Each of us probably has our own interpretation of what happens after we die. There are two books - one about a middle-aged man and one of a child - who were clinically dead and came back to tell what they had seen. Since they were both Christians, they saw the face of Jesus. Better than that . . . they are able to relay that to other Christians. 

The topic here is how we celebrate the life of a person and how do we comfort those left behind? Everybody does it differently and that is a beauty of this world where we live . . . for now.

   For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 

John 3:16  New International Version (NIV)

[People who read me on a regular basis might be interested to know that my first published article was in a Dog Magazine about a man who was killed on the way to a dog show in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. And the same person who encouraged me to submit that gave the Eulogy at my late husband's funeral. Some people are in your life for a reason.]