Every story has a beginning, middle and an end. 

You and I are going to go through one story to find each of these points. 

To do that we are going to try and do three things. 

Are you ready? 

This simple story has to do this well-loved, small, molded plastic reminder of where we’ll begin. 

Take a look at the details, if you will. 

Do you see the round bottom of the figure? 

This shows how well it is created to roll back and forth to create the first moments of finding a rhythm in life. 

That, my friends, is when this one green and yellow item began to bring joy. 

The things that told him they would wait for him.

It was also when our son, the one who found his rhythm, seemed to find that toys were the things that told him they would wait for him. 

Wait for him to be ready to learn and play again.

As if the steady step and beat of one friendly face could bring more. 

I’ll tell you it did because there is more to the story.

That is where the middle of the story comes into the scene. 

Of course. 

This one steady beat rolled into our world like the song from Mumford & Sons. 

Same title that shares about how I Will Wait for you. 

The middle of the story is when I learned how to wait for the joy to come back to us, when we were waiting for the rhythm to find all of us. 

This friendly face came with more that became the way our son found his way through moments of confusion and unknown. 

Ultimately, it is how he rewired his neurons when electrical storms known as seizures changed his rhythm for periods of time. 

You see, there were three more of these small, molded plastic toys that rolled with a soft click and clack after illness came to him. 

Four ways to restart joy.

Four little ways to restart joy. How did it happen in the middle of illness and what felt like stopping points in the middle? 

Oh, my goodness. 

Look at the edges of the friendly face with yellow and green. Do you see the rubbed off edges? 

Two little hands found every ridge and edge, including the top, and then found that each one could be rolled around a small space, and they could not be pushed over. 

Can you see it in your mind? Let me describe it a bit more. 

Our son would take all four of these small sized toys in his hands, find a space in our home with an open hard floor to roll them out then slowly push them around to watch each one wobble. 

A slight smile would then grow as calm came again. 

What a sight it was to see this in the middle of a changing life. 

Yes, the toys did wait for him.

Yes indeed, the toys did wait for him. 

Then came the sweetest thing in life. Incredibly, it was also when we started with the end of the story. 

We’re going to take one more look at this child sized molded plastic piece of joy. 

Do you see the plastic film that is tightly wrapped around the top? 

That is because of the time of a repetitive rolling and rocking of the toys meant that love met gentle use. 

Then one day, the toy popped in half as it steadily said ‘I will wait and be here’ for our son.

What do you do when a beloved toy is now in two pieces? 

Well, you fix it! 

That is exactly what I did and with the clear tape we had on hand. 

Then the two small hands held it again. 

Can you guess what happened? 

Yes, of course. The joyful rhythm continued with more clicks and clacks. 

And then one more thing happened. 

Perhaps you’ve found this in your life as a story with a beginning, middle and end is near. 

Another beginning came to us.

Another beginning came to us. 

More rolling and rhythms came to our son in a new space. 

I have wondered and wandered through time about how this came to him. 

Then I look at this small green and yellow, well-loved toy and remember how one end became a new beginning. 

Our son was quite like the toys that wobbled then popped up every time during a long time of his life.

One steady rhythm which included creating a harmonious time for him came to us because he listened to a click and clack that said I will wait for you to be ready to play again. 

Then our son played again. 

He learned more about how his life could be and we followed him. 

Imagining what can come is what I can do now. 

While I wander along with you. 

Let’s create the next beginning together.

Sitting, waiting, watching. 

These are the things that I’m doing today as the sun pops over the mountains to the east of my home. 

The things that I decided to do along with a day of lists. 

A day of rushing and then a moment of realization that came to me as I saw golden strands of light being pulled across one long cloud. 

This did not happen by chance. 

The moment came as I decided to sit beside the opened window. 

One decision that led to another as it came to me that the question of my day is continually about what we are going to do in this minute and, 

In this minute,

And this one. 

As now the golden hues are changing, and I am waiting for the orange to highlight the room. 

Watching what happens next. 

This is how a day can unfold when I sit. 

It also can come as the fullness of a day boggles my mind with awareness and beauty. 

Right amid the wondering of a weekend ahead. Such brightness that I’m tempted to close the window that shows me the breathtaking view. 

Yet I know that this is how I bring the oxygen back into my rooms. 

Opening a window is what I can do on days when the lists feel overwhelming. 

Add a bit of warmth in the room again. 

Perhaps joined with compassion and kindness towards myself and others around me and you. 

Back into life as I ask the question again.

Back into life as I ask the question again. 

What are we going to do? 

This, this is why I continue sitting, waiting, watching. 

To wonder and ask questions alongside others. 

Others who I have known as a former self and now greet with a gentle hello. 

‘Good to see you.’ 

‘What would you like to say today?’

While I watch for the full brilliant rays to flow around me in this room that now holds more that I can believe is here for me. 

It holds more for you, as well. 

Can you wonder about it with me? 

The joy that comes with wanting to squint into the brilliance is what I live with now. 

Now that others who showed me how to live with missing, longing and yearning are no longer here. 

Joy, grief and saying difficult words can live in a room filled with such light that it makes us look forward with kindness and graceful compassion. 

My friends. It’s for all of us. 

This life of breathing as the oxygen in the room is seeping in like the softness of a sunrise. 

Are you beginning to gently ask what am I going to do?

As you are beginning to gently ask what am I going to do? 

Feeling the gentle hues change in your time is a start. 

Letting the breath in one space for 

One

More

Movement 

And moment 

And then create joy. 

That is the resilient, the warmth and the possibility that is here. 

Together we can feel the air flow over us. 

Let’s begin here.

The layers of my grief look like a couple of things I’ve come across in life.

Over the years I’ve attempted to make a few things that seem to make me shake my head and stand back. 

Recently, I made a pie and that’s where the similarity stood out. 

Grief is like layers of a pie.

Grief is like layers of a pie. The bottom or beginning of grief is new and it seems ok.  

Then there is the middle with all the emotions that can pile up like ingredients. This is where it can feel mixed up, as if life will never be the same again. 

Finally, there is the top which can be disguised with a light crunch or sugar topping and then it is finally discovered that grief here is bumpy and ever changing!

As I watched the pie being made I found that while I thought I knew what I was doing it was surprising to find that a little adjustment was needed throughout the process. 

This pie is in the middle with the ingredients piled high. 

There are dots of butter to add more flavor, and that edge of the first layer can still be seen. 

Seems to be okay from this view, doesn’t it? 

This is where we can stand back and start to see more, my friends. 

The grief that comes in layers made me pause.

The grief that comes in layers made me pause as I made this pie. 

What if the ingredients inside were to change as another person wanted smooth chocolate filling instead of apples? 

How would those changes be seen by others in grief? Could they be adapted to be like a chameleon? 

Or is there only one way to make a pie and to grieve? 

Here is what I explored the day I rolled out the bottom layer that looks like it fits in the pie plate. 

I thought about how I didn’t know what I was doing at all in the first years after our son died, when I showed up for work and hoped to remember my password or where a file was on my computer. 

What I also hoped for was that others around me were kind and would help me seem ok. 

That world of seeming ok with all of it rolling forward did happen for me.

I sat with the messy middle of grief.

So, I sat with that for a time and then went into the messy middle of grief. 

Have you felt the messy middle while others were with you? 

The pile up of emotions ranged from chunks of disbelief that Dallin, our son, was no longer in our home, to gratitude for a life with our son. 

Then to sudden memories of who we were with him slipping down my cheeks as the tears would jump forward. 

Mounds of emotions needed to be felt and seen even when it seemed like life would never be the same again.

Truth came with this, as life never was the same again as part of the messy part, the piles of feeling continued and I felt them all. 

I began to be interested in this part of grief that I didn’t need to understand it all. I only experienced life and grief and wonder here and now.  

For me, there are many ways to make a pie and to experience grief. Being present with it was part of feeling and being then. 

The top is where I am now at times. 

I sit with the thought of ever being complete with grief, as I have found that it is truly ever changing.

For me, grief means I have loved and I will love our son forever. 

So, I will grieve and remember forever.

Loving and living with a bumpy ever-changing life is how to roll out the top of the pie.

Loving and living with a bumpy ever-changing life is how to roll out the top of a pie. 

Will it sometimes cover a delicious layer of ingredients piled high and dotted with more flavor? 

Yes, most likely. 

I will also most likely continue to have a pile of emotions with the grief that comes in layers. 

For me that means that joy, resilience, confusion, wonder, and sadness all create this life that can bring experience. 

Some days are smooth like that bottom layer or like different filling. 

Other days are bumpy like a top layer of pie that is part of grief and love, life and sorrow. 

What are your layers of grief bringing you? 

Let’s discover them here together.

Today is the first time ever that I’ve let myself sit back and think about the last two years. 

If people knew how similar these two years were to another time in my life, then I wonder what would be said. 

I came to this pause as I sat, watched, listened and answered questions near others. 

This scene came at the end of the year and looked like this. 

A table was decorated with a long gray cloth then blocks of color and festive animation was strewn along the top. 

Then you can see rows of hand drawn prints from long ago made from markers, crayons, and pencils. 

Piles of books that included ways to dance through life were front and center. 

The book about The Boy Who Became More Than We Could Imagine was about grief, joy, love and that unstoppable son of ours. 

Think about that and find your song. 

It’s what people wondered about as they rolled past the decorated table.

Some wondered if there was a song for easy days and hard days.

Some wondered if there was a song for easy days and hard days.

Others glanced as they were searching for different things on their list. 

What came to me during the day including feelings of gratitude for each moment as the beginning came back to me. 

There is also the feeling of if they only knew what we lived through to come to this point of smiling and say good morning then I wonder if there would be more wonderment, joy, and sitting with what comes. 

That is when the quote came saying 

If people knew how hard I had to work to gain my mastery, it would not seem so wonderful at all.

Michelangelo

Standing, watching and waiting next to this table for a day gave me time to remember that hard work that came in the first two years when our son survived his illness. 

That illness that changed the course of his life and the trajectory of ours. 

If people knew how hard I worked alongside our son as he gained back his ability to walk.

If people knew how hard I had worked alongside our son as he gained back his ability to walk again, to use his hands in the beginning and to return home from the hospital. 

Other moments started to flow as I sat with the wonderment of what I had come through with our son. 

It was then that I paused with the next powerful time of wonder. 

Wonder is what came to me from the beginning with our son. 

He brought light and joy, peace and motion, calm and deep questions from the day he arrived in our life. 

Picture a pudgy baby with bright eyes and long fingers that both opened wide from his first minutes. 

Gazing into your eyes with an immediate desire to go into life. 

Life is what came to use for the following two years with wild joy. 

Sitting with sticks, splashing in puddles, gazing at stars or fireworks. 

Each year started like this one and if people only knew how much work we put into creating joy, then it would seem more wonderful that they could see. 

Does that seem beyond contemplation to you? 

It did to me at the time. 

Yet as I stood next to a table with a story to be told, it all flowed over me with such sweetness that I could barely contain it in my eyes. 

Did I yearn for those first two years and then next two and then those following years to always be with me? 

Yes, and always will.

The words that I shared with those who stopped that day out of curiosity, kindness or desire to know more about our son were like icing on a final birthday cake. 

Spread thin, delightful and yet never enough. 

If people know that what I wanted to do what go sit with each of them and talk.

If people knew that what I wanted to do was go sit with each of them, talk for hours about how every year from start to finish was exquisite and planted firmly in my soul. 

Would they do it with me? Could we do it for each other? 

Yet what if all of us did that? 

Sat with others, shared about the exquisite moments that are planted firmly? 

Perhaps if people know that about us then our tables in life will also show joy beyond measure, lights that twinkle like stars at night from our ancestors and help us reach for what comes next. 

Who wants to join me for this part of life?  

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. 

The heat of summer is here in my part of the world. 

Yet I am still pulling on the long sleeves and closed toe shoes to stay comfy when the fans and air conditioning comes on. 

Some may say that this is different from their realm. I say I am finer than frog hair when it comes to how I’m feeling inside an old cold building. 

Now, let me sit in the sun and dip my toes into a pool and that is where you may find me feeling a bit more relaxed in at least sandals and a shorter sleeved top! 

Think about what being fine means to you. 

Now, let’s go with this time-tested quote of being like an amphibian and being finer than frog hair. 

This is one phrase that I’ve heard over the years from my dad when he describes a good and now, a great day. 

When he first began saying it, I would laugh and agree. 

Then I started to think about it and would wonder. 

Does a frog have hair?  

How fine is it? 

What does this mean and why does my dad continue to say it? 

Over the years, there are few things that I have come to take from this timely saying. 

Here are a couple for you to consider with me. 

Being finer than frog hair could mean that the thing is excellent.

Being finer than frog hair could mean that the thing in front of me is supremely excellent. 

It could be that the decorations, dress or setting is marvelous and amazing. 

I like this way of looking at things because it seems to pull my eyes to what is beautiful and going well. 

It is the way I am choosing to look at a view that brings in the excellent pieces. 

Looking at the details in a way that brings out the best parts. 

That is being in joy for this moment. 

M’hm. Fine is marvelous with this way of looking at things. 

Now, another way to view is perhaps what I have come to learn with my dad saying this over these years. 

When he says I’m finer than frog hair it could be alongside other details.

When he says I’m finer than frog hair it can be right alongside some other details he is holding onto for that moment. 

Perhaps he is getting ready to rest and has settled into a comfy chair. 

The striped blanket is near and so is the fan that can be adjusted by a long stick. 

Being fine in this sense of the phrase is being in this moment with whoever is next to him. 

Smiling or thinking about things that happen around him. 

Looking at the one person who is there most often and that he says incredibly personal things to during a day. 

Maybe that is how my dad feels finer than frog hair as well. 

Who is that person? Well, the one who has been through thick and thin and back again! 

Thanks, mom, for being the one who makes the world good and beautiful and truly finer than frog hair. 

You’ve outdone yourself. 

What grand appreciation there is for watching you two create finer moments. 

Have you seen this in your realm? 

Now, what sense of this quote do you feel drawn to? 

Here is one more consideration.

I feel this when I see a color in the wind or in a row of flowers. 

My, how that is finer than what I could have expected. 

It is truly exceptional and better than a chorus of frogs on lily pads. 

What about seeing an amazing piece of art or design that makes you stop in your tracks? 

Aha. That is where my heart has jumped and I found myself tilting my head a bit to the left, pausing as I wondered in awe about how the creation was started. 

There are many times when a walk through a museum or gallery has slowed my steps to consider such beautiful things in this world I get to be in. 

Wait, did I say two things? 

Delete that because I have a third. 

Friends who bring a sense of being finer than frog hair.

I would be mistaken if I did not add this piece about friends, true friends, who bring a sense of being finer than frog hair. 

Being in the tiny moments with a friend, like the two boys in my house, is like sunshine bouncing off a lake in a bright morning. 

Starting on a hike at dawn and then reaching a mountain lake right as the birds sing. 

Watching the hilarity of comedians going off script and loving every minute of it. 

Okay! I understand that I am the one who received this chorus so often. 

I now invite you to find, create and be around those who bring this purposeful wonder to your world. 

Think about what is finer than frog hair in your world and do more of it. 

My dad will be grinning at all of it right along with me.