Letter to Mom (2 Years in Heaven)

Dear Mom,

A lot has happened since you left us two years ago. I'll try to bring you up to speed.

Snow and ice storms are happening in April. Two of my former teachers (Hudson Keenan and Ted McIntyre) actually kept a log of all snow days called for Mount Pleasant Public Schools since 1960, and we have never had school cancelled due to snow or ice as late as April 17.

They closed the Kmart in Mount Pleasant that we use to go to all the time. Remember we would eat in their cafeteria in between shopping. They are closing department stores and bookstores at a fast pace, and I think the change of finding a place we use to take him to all of a sudden shuttered is quite hard on Jonathan. He doesn't quite get any enjoyment out of shopping online yet. We have found Baker Book House in Grand Rapids that may be positioned to keep standing for years to come and we will visit there tomorrow. 

Donald Trump has been President now for 15 months. Contrary to the gloom and doom predictions of some the world hasn't ended. Life is much the same for the average folks like us. Old people like Billy Graham, Barbara Bush, and Uncle Tom are still dying. Young people are still getting autism without us knowing the cause and youth are still taken away to early from gun violence. There are still wars, abortions, suffering and injustices in every corner of the world. Those of us who have faith can hold on to the hope that God will bring peace someday.

I'm still seeking to promote the positive of politics as unusual and autism heroes through blogging, although the time available for me to write is increasingly less these past few years. The older I get the more I believe we all have a darker side and a lighter side available to us each day, and we need God's grace to help to walk in the light. 

I remember all the times when we would watch television together. Hearing the Rondeau theme of Masterpiece Theater still reminds me of the time we would spend watching shows in the evening.

A new show out there called Timeless is about time travel and watching it makes me long to be able to go back to days of yesteryear when we could be together again.

I'm taking Jonathan on a trip around Michigan to visit every YMCA in the state. When we visited the Jackson YMCA, I brought Jonathan by the Woodland Cemetery in Jackson and a local couple on their regular walk through the cemetery helped us find the graves for your parents and maternal grandparents, since I knew the plot was in section 31. Tell Grandma and Grandpa hello for me. I captured this candid photo of Jonathan kneeling at their graves.

Your family is all doing well, but we miss you often and no more than on this day. Next month your three boys will be together at the Mount Pleasant Community Foundation dinner as they give out your scholarship to a student aspiring to be a teacher like you. Your love for teaching lives on through that.

When the times are tough the memories of you bring a smile. I will remember you with smiles, because I know that is the way you will always remember us.

I like to say that, "Nothing is as good as it seems or as bad as it seems." Except that doesn't hold true regarding where you are today. I'm sure things are beyond what we could have imagined up there. As 1 Corinthians 2:9 says, "But as it is written:

Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,

Nor have entered into the heart of man

The things which God has prepared for those who love him.

Love,

Your son always.