I took the day off for Ian's birthday; he would have been 20. Eric made it at work until 9:30am, then he called and said he was coming home too. The day was harder than I thought it would be. We took fresh flowers to Ian's grave then we met with a few of Ian's friends at one of his favorite restaurants - IHOP. We met late (for us) at 8:30pm, ate and shared Ian stories. Ian had some great friends and it meant a lot to us to spend the evening with them. It was a good night.
Two days later I flew off to Colorado for a long overdue, girls weekend with my high school friends, Debbie & Kelly (we all turned 50 this year and needed to celebrate). I kept waiting for some catastrophe to occur to ruin the weekend; my back goes out, my car breaks down on the way to the airport, our plane crashes....something....but nothing happened. We had a great weekend. Sometimes there is nothing like old friends who know you, love you and let you be yourself. Our first night in Breckenridge, Deb took us to her favorite restaurant and we were sitting around the table, having a good time, laughing - then it hit me - I shouldn't be laughing, I've lost Ian. Then this small voice told me, "It's okay mom, I want you to have a good time." and it all seemed alright. It was a great weekend and a much needed reprieve.
Yesterday, Eric, my dad and I went to Santa Barbara to make some decisions on Ian's headstone and to see his art work at the Channing Peake Gallery. It was a very emotional day. I wrote the woman who organized the show to thank her for such a gripping arrangement of Ian's work and this was her reply:
"His
work has garnered such praise from people who visit the exhibition, the work
looks so mature and people are moved by his story. I gave him his own wall
because the work was so strong that frankly it might take away from any work
that was placed next to it! When I place work on walls it is often a balancing
act to make sure one piece does not overshadow the other, but Ian’s is one of
those compelling pieces that is so powerful it needs it’s own space; and it’s
great that it is on a wall that people see first when they enter the building.
They are taken by the image and then they read his story."How wonderful that Ian's work stands on it's own merit.
The hardest part of grieving, besides the obvious, of missing Ian, are the questions it raises. I'm doing what I can to resolve those questions - I attend a grief bible study, Eric & I see a grief counselor, I read books on grief but it's a slow process. The other night in my bible study we read from Job (normally I avoid Job like the plaque); "and Job did not sin and he didn't blame God." That has stuck with me and confused me. Trying to marry God's sovereignty with Ian's death has been hard.....some people's definition of God's sovereignty would mean because He is in charge of everything, that He caused Ian's death and if He did, then who else is there to blame but God? But Job didn't blame God, so he must have known something we don't. I don't think sovereignty means 'dictator' or 'puppet master'. I'm no biblical scholar, I'm no great mind. I'm just a mom, trying to figure out God's role in all this loss. Greater minds than mine have studied and poured over scripture to try and define God and it just seems to me that maybe we spend too much time trying to define Him when we should just be worshiping Him. Maybe it just needs to come down to simple worship - not debating the 5 points of Calvinism or Free Will. God is so much more complex than we can imagine. The truth is usually some place in the middle and I think there are things we are not meant to or capable of understanding. I know thinking about all this hurts my head.
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