Paths Crossed

On a winter day, his mane will sway and bend by the winds that blow,

He will cock an ear, and what he’ll hear, only heaven will know.

He will watch and wait, silent at the gate for the journey that you are on,

for you to step astride.  Ride cowboy ride, a long trot toward the dawn.

I will watch in wonder and question the thunder of hoof beats of the past,

and understand with honest hand, the calling that was cast,

To leave this place with humbled grace, this life where you roam.

You take a sigh, a final goodbye, you are now heading home.

A.K. Moss. 2017

How do we say goodbye to a friend? How long do we hold the memory, the smell,  the sound? What do we do with the feeling of guilt? We should have been more, done more, said more… How do we handle the ache or the fear of letting go?

I had watched my sister quietly fade away with cancer. She was a strong and courageous woman who in her final months had said the healing journey we had been on, all the diverse modalities of healing were not for her, she had said they were for me. At age 50, she left us on a quiet candle-lit night.

When I lost my second dad, we had seen him the night before, as we said our goodbyes, he was bouncing our nephew on his knee. The family thought we had more time, but he left us in the wee hours of the morning.

Life is filled with hellos and goodbyes. And that sequence makes up life, and will always be there. Sometimes you don’t know who affected you, or your life until they are gone.

This last week I said goodbye to one more friend. I was able to gracefully say all that I wanted to and listen to the words he wanted to say.

With an ache in my heart, I said my final goodbye and walked out, knowing this would be final. I had sat with the family and we hashed out good times and memories of strength and ambition, of hopes and reality.

I hope with all that I have seen today from helping a calf take its first breath, to walking away and letting the family have a quiet time with the passing. And let them finish the journey they are on. That I walk away a better person, to carry them in my heart. Not as a weight, but as an uplifting thought. A smile, a sound, or a smell brings them back to me full force, so much that the ache in my heart stops me for a moment, I sigh with a tear that runs down my cheek, then a smile crosses my lips as I say, “boy you got me on that one.

Some days I ache for what I once had, the safety of it, the normal feeling of someone to share the chaos with. The emotion and feeling that I can not go one more step further.

Yet I do. I rise in the morning, get dressed put my best foot forward, and go through the motion. At some point, I realized that I have a journey too. That my life is a memory for those around me and those who I have shared memories with. It helps me not lose the memories of those who have gone from my life but gives me the courage to face tomorrow with the memories I make today. Though the smell from Papa’s favorite jacket will fade, he is a part of who I am and what I do.

I know that I am not the same person I was yesterday or will I be tomorrow. But those people who have touched my life, have given me experiences and adventures I would not have had if we had not crossed paths.

So as I sit in my idling car, I look at his bay horse, standing there with the wind whipping through his mane. He lifts his head over the top rail, standing at attention to something not meant for my eyes.  I tip my hat with a tear and an empty feeling in my heart.  I say goodbye to one more who has ridden through my life. One who has made me laugh, who has challenged me, and who made my life richer for knowing him.  I pull out of their driveway and begin the long drive alone down the dirt road, across the desert a place he called home.