twelve

Matt would've been twelve today.

I meant to get up early. As it turned out, I couldn't quite face the morning. My alarm rang out; I lay still and waited. It took a while.

Eventually I braved the day. Washed. Breakfasted. Readied myself for work & headed out the door into the fresh September sunshine. As I walked down the path from the house to the street, I saw a guy who has just started to go to the village church. We greeted each other. He was heading down to church to read a book John the (now retired) vicar had given him. I told him I was heading that way too, so we chatted and parted at the churchyard gates - him to the church, me to the yard.

It was a beautiful autumnal morning. I'm sure the temperature will warm up later, but the first chill in the air told the story that the summer has left us, and the year is turning. When Matt died the summer was young, but that was three months ago. They say it gets easier; they're being kind, but of course they know full well it doesn't. Matt still doesn't greet me with that enormous smile of his, those eyes that speak love, that embrace that warms me on the coldest day.

I walked down to his grave. And, standing with the fields behind me & the Calverley angel before me, I spoke stories of my days to the earth that covers his remains, and then covered those with tears.

There are moments when I feel him close by. The other day I was home, in my front room, and the chair next to me made the noise it made when he would turn on it as he sat there. I stared at it. Empty, of course. There are nights when I would swear his weight rests on my legs. The tricks of grief. The arrows that open up a wounded heart to check it yet may bleed a little more.

Back to my car. Back to work. And as I drove, I thought of that passage in the Old Testament, in 2 Samuel 12, where King David loses a son. Before the boy dies, as his life slips away, he begs, pleads, prays the boy might live. When he is lost, David washes himself, dresses, goes to temple and worships. He is questioned about this and his reply is basically - what else should I do? What else indeed. So I switched on my iPod. Chose some music. And worshipped.

I'll praise Him for all that is past, and trust Him for all that's to come.

O my beautiful Matt. Happy birthday lovely boy.