Dylan Stafford

2017 Fourth of July

Hi sister Lisa,

It’s been a year since I wrote you. I hope you’re in heaven, peaceful, and that you are still aware of us here. If you already know what’s going on with us then me writing you will be redundant. But it makes me feel better to talk to you this way, so here’s an update.

My boys—your nephews—are a year older than when you left us last year. They are ten and five now, starting fifth grade and kindergarten at the end of summer. For this one glorious year they will be at the same school, and we will take them together. No more day care.

Wow. For the last nine years, I have had a carpool buddy every day as I brought them to day care near my office. For nine years, over my right shoulder in the back seat, my commute buddies have been keeping me company up the 405 to the UCLA exit. The end of day care will be the end of a chapter.

Christian is ready for kindergarten. I bought him a neon yellow backpack last month and told him it was because he’s a big boy now. We’ve been practicing using it, putting his lovey and blankey in it each day and wearing his backpack into day care, like a big kid. He’s a happy guy, always smiling, and he loves soccer.

And Jackson is going to be a fifth-grader. Yikes!

One of your quotes Lisa, that I still use, was “be a tourist in your own town.”

Fifth grade was a big year in my life. In fifth I went to the elementary school across town, instead of Hyde Park down the street. My teachers in fifth and sixth were excellent, and got me loving learning. Fifth was an adventure for me, I was discovering a whole new world, in our little town of Denison.

Jackson is going to have a big summer this year. He’s going to fly on an airplane by himself, twice. In July, he’ll travel to spend a week with Marisa’s parents. Then in August, he’ll travel for a week with our parents. Big boy stuff for sure.

We all miss you Lisa.

Christian knows when I’m thinking about you. He’ll see me getting sad about you and he’ll give me his best five-year-old pep talk.

“Daddy,” he’ll say, smiling and looking up. “I know you’re going to get sad ‘cuz you miss Aunt Lisa. But she’s in your heart Daddy. You don’t have to be sad.”

When Christian and I drive up the 405 each morning, we always pass the Los Angeles National Cemetery, with the rows and rows of white tombstones. When Jackson was in day care, he and I started a tradition of saying “Thank you soldiers” and Christian and I have continued it.

But last year Lisa, after you passed, Christian added something new. He started saying, “Hi Aunt Lisa. We miss you.”

It made me weepy at first, but after a while I got used to it, and even appreciative of it. I like talking to you out loud with Christian. It’s become a nice little hello moment, and we’ll add it to it now.

“Hope you see Michael Jackson today in heaven.” “Hope they have bowling today in heaven. Or donuts.” We imagine moments for you.

Mom and Dad are doing fine. They’ve been married 52 years!

Donald Trump is the President now. Mom and Dad didn’t vote the same, like a lot of households. But their marriage is stronger than this current political melodrama. When they were married, LBJ was in the White House, not exactly the most placid period in our history. They’ve survived Vietnam and Watergate and the fall of the Berlin Wall, and this is their 10^th President. They’ll weather this chapter too.

They miss you sister.

Mom shows it most. She doesn’t cry so much now. For the first months you were gone, the crying came a lot. Anything could cause it. We made it through all those “firsts” without you: first birthday, first Christmas, first New Year’s, first anniversary of your passing.

Your memorial service was beautiful last year.

We held it in August, three months after you had passed, at First Presbyterian Church in Ft. Worth, Mom and Dad’s congregation. We were in the new worship hall, with the modern architecture and the big glass windows that face west.

Before we began, all the family gathered in the side room for a prayer. Cousins from both sides, the two aunts we have left, Mom and Dad and Jon, we all held hands and bowed our heads.

Then we filed into the main hall.

I wasn’t ready for that moment. It was intense and I didn’t expect it. When a young person dies, the funerals are big. But it wasn’t the number of people; it was the silence. Filing in, with a lifetime of community looking at us, I wasn’t ready for that solemn silence.

My right hand was on Jackson’s shoulder in front of me, and my left hand was trailing behind holding Christian’s hand. As the intensity of the moment hit me, I literally had the thought, “Left foot. Right foot. Just walk and sit down. That’s all you have to do Dylan.”

Your memorial service was how Mom and Dad wanted it. They chose the hymns to sing, coordinated with the church to find the date. Michael Waschevski officiated and he did a gracious and compassionate job: He knows you, and our family. His words were clear and heartfelt and I was ever so grateful.

All the communities of our whole lifetime showed up Lisa—childhood, teen-age, college, adult—all the chapters of your life were there.

The reception afterwards was a mix of everyone. Cousins from out of state met our Texas cousins for the first time. Elementary school friends met college friends. Your friends met Mom and Dad’s friends. It was a tossed salad of all the people of a full life.

Mom and Dad stood and spoke with everyone. It was a reception line that I wish they had never had to stand in, because it was happening because you are gone.

We all miss you Lisa, but Mom misses you the most. You all were connected on so many levels: mother/daughter, friends, confidants. But it was Mom who was trying hardest those last years to help you find a balance with your health issues. Mom was the one who wanted to be there with you at your doctors’ appointments, to make sure you had continuity of care, that the professionals could have the full picture and offer you the best counsel.

You were most present with Mom. And your absence causes the biggest hole in Mom’s life.

You wrote those beautiful notes to Mom over those last years. She has shared them with me, your 3×5 cards with your words of gratitude for that special relationship you both shared. How did you know to do that? I’m so glad that you did.

We’ve all been checking in with Mom all through the year.

In one conversation, she told me, “Dylan, this has been the hardest year of my life. Bar none. It’s terrible that Lisa is gone. But at that reception, as all those people stood in line and spoke with Dad and me, from that point forward, you know what? I’ve never felt more loved. I’m seventy-something years old but never in my life have I felt more supported.”

And Mom misses you. We all do.

When Mom showed my your 3×5 notes that you’d given her, it made me remember your handwriting.

Your script was so beautiful Lisa. I remember back in high school when you developed that distinctive way of writing that is so uniquely yours. You would journal and keep a diary. Your script turned each word into a little work of art, with your swirls and your special flourishes.

And now I treasure those pieces of you, those written remembrances.

One of your high school friends messaged me on Facebook this year. She’d come across a letter that you wrote to her years ago, a letter of encouragement. She took a photo of your letter and sent it to me, with her own appreciation of what your friendship meant to her. I recognized your love and your penmanship.

I miss our hugs. You were so tall, almost the same height as me, and I miss our hugs, when you would smile your sweet smile and say, “Oh hello ‘nunna.”

I miss your hands. You had such long fingers and your hands were always so graceful. I get sad that your hands are no more. Silly thing, but that’s how it has been for me this first year. Missing you one part at a time.

Maybe that’s all I can deal with so far, to miss pieces of you.

In this first year of your absence, the sadness will catch me. I’ll have a moment of “Oh, I’ll call Lisa about that” only to realize that I can’t call you.

It happens to Jon too. He’s told me that he’ll have the same thought, a “Oh, Lisa will know about whatever topic. I’ll call her.” only then to remember he can’t call you.

You were always our family historian. If there were some question about “What happened?” from our childhood, we would always default to your memory. Now we can’t do that.

Jon and I are talking more. For some years, I knew about our brother mostly through you, like you and Jon had the primary relationship, and I heard updates second hand.

Did you hear Jon and me talking about you last month? He went with me to my 30-year high school class reunion in Denison. I know, who takes their brother with them to their high school reunion? I did! And it was great.

I couldn’t have attended without him. Too many ghosts.

We stopped in front of our old childhood home. The red oaks in the front yard are huge. We drove by Hyde Park elementary down the street. They’ve moved the front door to the side. We drove over to Loy Lake and took goofy hero-pose photos like we used to do on backpacking trips when we were kids. We went downtown to First Presbyterian, our childhood church.

The last time I’d been to Denison was with you, when you went with me to Priscilla and Scott’s wedding in February of 2012. That was five years ago.

Remember when Priscilla turned to Scott during their wedding ceremony? You elbowed me and whispered in my ear, “She’s gonna sing.”

And sure enough, she sang.

When the rain is blowing in your face

And the whole world is on your case

I could offer you a warm embrace

To make you feel my love

I sat and cried as Priscilla’s amazing voice melted away everything except her love for Scott. She gifted us all with music and poetry and grace.

And I thought Scott was the strongest man I’ve ever met as he stood there, holding hands with his new bride and staring into her eyes as she sang to him. And I don’t know how he held it together!

At the reception, when I asked him about it, he told me. “I didn’t know what was gonna happen. But when I saw she was going to sing, I told myself ‘Don’t lock your knees. Don’t lock your knees.’”

Priscilla told me years later that at the time of her wedding she didn’t know yet that Adele had covered that song and made it popular again. She’d heard it on American Idol and liked it. And only later did she (and I) learn that Bob Dylan wrote the lyrics.

I was introduced to Adele sitting next to you as we listened to Priscilla, our childhood friend and neighbor and one of the people we share in the journey of living. Adele was always on the radio the next year or two, and it always made me smile and be grateful that you’d gone with me to Priscilla’s wedding.

This week, as I’ve been writing this to you, I told Mom and Dad about “Make You Feel My Love” and we looked it up. Turns out Bob Dylan influenced more than Adele with that song. We found it covered by Billy Joel, by Garth Brooks, and even a duet with Engelbert Humperdink and Willie Nelson!

You loved music Lisa. Music was so important to you.

Ah, Lisa.

What else can I tell you about the first year of life without you?

Christmas caught me off guard. I can tell you about that.

So many of my childhood memories are of Dad being a preacher and of us being preacher’s kids sitting in church. Especially at Advent, it seemed like all we did was sit in church and wait for Christmas. One more week. One more candle. One more super-slow step towards Christmas.

As a child it took forever, but now as an adult Christmas arrives so quickly.

This year, when the Christmas hymns were sung, they made me weep. All that shared life that we had as kids in Dad’s world at First Presbyterian, all our remembered joy, got distilled into hearing the Christmas hymns this year. On Christmas Eve, at the end of the service when we sang Joy to the World, the tears were flowing as I was missing you.

In my memory, you are always my happy little sister and we are all running around First Presbyterian after a fellowship dinner, high on sugar from eating too much dessert. In my memory, you are my best friend my senior year of high school, your freshman year, when we rode to school together every day in my red truck. In my memory, you are the English major, deconstructing and analyzing and amazing me with your intellect. In my memory, you are my guide into a life of sobriety. And in my memory, you are always going to be here.

But now, it is life without you in it.

No more Lisa-isms, the way you gave every animal a nickname, and spoke in that amazing high voice that made animals and little children flock to you.

No more “Nunna hugs” with your twinkling smile.

No more “Let me play you a new song” on your iPhone, as your long delicate fingers dialed up some Lady Gaga song you needed to educate me about, or some classic rock rarity from your endless archives.

Last 4^th of July I wrote to you and it worked out to write you again this year.

I’m in Colorado, in Estes Park, on vacation with Mom and Dad and Marisa and the boys. Jon couldn’t come this year, but we’ve been texting pictures and calling. I’m on the porch. It’s 5:48 am, but the day is well under way. It gets light so early here.

The mountains were purple about ten minutes ago, in the early light, and now they are taking on a stronger grey, with the snowy white highlights.

I’ve been writing to you this last week. I want you to know how much you are still in my life Lisa, in my heart and in my thoughts. I want to honor your life, and the gift you are to me and to so many other people.

I’ll end with this, my gratitude to you for sobriety.

You gifted me with sobriety. In 2000, you held my hand and guided me to the rooms of 12-step sobriety. You gave me a gift that has given me a life.

All of my life radiates out from that starting point of surrendering-to-win, of taking on a new manner of living.

Being sober, one day at a time, is the center of the circles of my life, the bull’s eye. Everything that works in my life is connected to this way of life that you taught me.

Patience. Compassion. Tolerance. Love. Honesty. Vulnerability. Tenderness. All the best qualities that I would ever like to nurture, to pay forward to life, to Marisa, to the boys, all those qualities get a chance to take root and grow because you gave me the gift of sobriety. Absent your gift, life is a different proposition entirely.

Each morning this week, I’ve been writing you. That is another gift, the miraculous ability to get up early! Ha!

In the quiet before the boys wake up, with a cup of coffee and a fleece out here on the porch, in these mornings of introspection, I’ve been with you. And you’ve been with me.

Each of us will die some day. Dying is not a unique accomplishment; we will each do it once. Living is the opportunity.

You lived Lisa.

You were captain of your own ship, all the way to the end of your voyage.

I wish we could have supported you differently. I wish you were still sailing with us here on earth.

This essay is me remembering you in this first year of your passing. This essay is me honoring you. This essay is me saying thank you to you, again, for the gifts you gave me, as a sister, as a friend, and as my spiritual shepherd. You guided me into the folds of a way of life that gives me a chance to live gratefully, and to pay it forward to other people. I get to be a decent person Lisa, one day at a time, and to that, I owe you my life.

I love you Lisa. I miss you Lisa.

Hope the fireworks tonight look beautiful from heaven.

 

6:08 am Estes Park Colorado. July 4, 2017