I was just thinking about you, I said to the picture as I walked past it for the tenth time that day.

Am I the only one who thinks about you? 

Then I paused and began to wonder. 

What would the person dressed in blue with the brilliant smile, long arms and tall curly hair say to me now if he could. 

The day I walked by numerous times was one of refreshing, renewal and restarting. 

I had done this over many years and here I was ready to go one more time. 

As I began to imagine what the tall one in the picture would have said to me now, I suddenly thought of a song and my toe tapped out a quick rhythm. 

Get Up Offa That Thing dance through me with a smile.

Get Up Offa That Thing by James Brown danced through me with a smile. 

Yes, exactly, that would be the message from the boy with the bright eyes and curly hair. 

The one who loved this fast beat and the words that came with it. 

Can you hear it? 

If not, let me share what came to me as the music flowed over my pacing and settled into our rooms. 

This soul reaching music starts with a quick two step and horns. Are they trumpets? Could it be a saxophone? 

Then there is a whistle, and some calling to others to come and dance. 

My friends, my soul knew this was something I needed as the pause through my house became a shoulder shake and clap to this song with a big smile. 

When have we needed to release the pressure of a moment? 

Sing with others, call others around and gather to refresh to create good times? 

Could it be when there is a change we didn’t choose so the loss and grief feel overwhelming, constant, ever present or just around the corner? 

Maybe it’s when the soft losses are always near and your heart reaches for something familiar. 

I’ve been in both spaces.

Perhaps that is why I was thinking about the boy who is no longer with us, the one who loved to dance.

Dancing with good music was always a way to start it with the boy in blue for me. 

I now know that I can up off that thing, dance and gather with others.

While I needed to look at a picture to create this moment and now know that I can get up offa that thing, dance, gather with others or one other and do one thing. 

Feeling better was what this moment brought me to feel good.

What came next kept my feet going for hours. 

I call them good memories even when the salty tears are rolling over my cheeks. 

The memories of dancing with the tall boy who knew how to stomp his feet to a fun song came rushing over me. 

These questions also came suddenly like the chorus in the song. 

Was I going to forget these moments at some time? 

Did the loss of his physical being mean I was the only one who had these coming to me? 

How could I live in this moment and keep Dallin with me? 

What if no one ever said his name again? 

M’hm. Can you hear the cascade of call outs getting bigger? 

Oh, this is where I began to refresh and check in with others. 

No, I was not the only one who said Dallin’s name. It was time to start with the two step again and listen to the horns. 

Get up. Dance. Find the beat.

Get up. Dance. Find the beat in life. 

Renewal can also come when I move my body to come to a new point. 

Getting to a new point does not mean I have forgotten what has been or where I have come from. 

This can also be when I remember to have strength. 

Not only physical strength but emotional, to let the feelings and the love and the joy and missing and the rhythm continue. 

It is how I can now decide to dance, call out to others who may be here looking to restart while keeping the love and continue asking what a tall one would say to me now. 

What and who does your rhythm include? 

Let’s dance and find it together! 

Writing

#70 Collateral Beauty

#81 Dancing into Heaven

I loved to learn about words and how to use them in a sentence when I was in school. 

English was a class that taught me to look deeply at what each one could mean at that time. 

This is when I also learned that some words could have more than one meaning. 

Come with me as we go into what else looking deeply can bring to you and me. 

During my early years, I stared at the stars at night with cousins and studied earnestly about other topics. 

At times this looked like laying in the long grass behind a yellow stucco home as the lights popped out after the sun went down. 

The grass needed to be stomped down with sneakers, so the rough stickers stayed down. 

This was how we waited for the stars. 

If only I could look deeply enough.

Staring into space for the big dipper, little bear and north star came next.

It was as if the sky told us to be quietly aware of what could be seen if only I could look deeply enough. 

Studying earnestly became a space that was expansive like the stars above. 

I opened books about trees, flowers and bugs. Examples were gathered of leaves after walking through miles on a university campus. 

First, I would look up at the canopy of a tree, identify the leaf, gather it up and smash it into a large book to wait. 

When the leaf was ready, I would place them in a book then get ready for a display. 

There were other topics I studied, and I wondered about at first. 

I found that looking at a variety of things, such as a gold gorilla, brought a smile and a deep gaze. 

Fun can be found when a pause comes with the space around us. 

Was it possible? 

I wonder if there is a way to look at other meanings of the words that I learned about in my younger years. 

The beginnings had some and now it was time to go deeper.

What else was there to know after looking into the expanse of space? 

This came to me years after the grass was stomped down. 

I looked deeply into the eyes of a truly wonderful soul.

It was later that I looked deeply into the eyes of a truly wonderful soul. He was one I admired greatly for the delight he brought to the world. 

Perhaps you know someone like I did. 

A person who did the impossible while teaching you how to look deeply into one more thing. 

I have learned to look at this way as well. 

While I find that there are moments of grief that come now, I have learned to sit with the joy that came with every day of learning. 

I have eyed lovingly what is around me after the many days of learning from looking deeply into the eyes of that person. 

Then I came to this thought.

If I could look deeply into the stars and my studies along with the eyes of one who I love, could I also do this with other things? 

I recently sat with this as I watched the sun come up in the morning. 

Gazing into the unknown space is what I can do as I observe new spaces that come.

Wondering, sitting with it, and learning about what can come. 

This is what I now know. It’s what we can do with fun together.