Our black and white cat, pet companion and my beloved fur baby Willow died on Valentine’s Day, Ash Wednesday. My Beloved little Mother died on 23 December 2023, just under 8 weeks earlier. Grief upon grief. I had neglected Willow, in the form of companionship, to care for my Mum. When she died, I had wanted to make it up to Willow, by spending time with him. Now he was dying too. I recognised the signs that I had seen in my Mum, namely in his inability to eat. Food he had once enjoyed, he turned his face away. Mum too had suddenly stopped enjoying treats. “Chocolate tastes nasty” she had said about her former favourite bite to eat. His dying reminded me of Mum’s dying. I had said to her. Dying is hard work, it is hard. Yet in her own way she had triumphed over death by the way she died. And now she helped me too with Willow’s death.
The week before Willow took a rapid downhill turn, I had been sorting out Mum’s personal effects, that had been kept in storage. I had discovered a little booklet entitled:
ENFOLDED
IN LOVE
Daily Readings with
JULIAN OF NORWICH
Although I like the writings of Julian of Norwich, initially I had not wanted to look at it. Too religious and airy fairy was my bias thought. How can an anchoress from the late fourteenth and early fifteenth century help comfort me over my twenty-first century type grief for a pet cat?
I had often thought that Heaven would not be Heaven without animals, yet suddenly when faced with losing Willow, I wondered what happens to animals when they die? Will I ever meet him again?
I had called the vet and on the day he was due to die, I opened the page of the booklet. It opened at page 3, here.
He Keeps All That Is Made
He showed me a little thing, the size of a hazelnut, in the palm of my hand , and it was as round as a ball. I looked at it with my mind’s eye and I thought, “What can this be?” And answer came, ” It is all that is made.” I marvelled that it could last, for I thought it might have crumbled to nothing, it was so small. And the answer came into my mind, ” It lasts and ever shall because God loves it” And all things have being through the love of God.
In this little thing I saw three truths. This first is that God made it (him). The second is that God loves it (him). The third is that God looks after it (him).
What is He indeed that is maker and lover and keeper? I cannot find words to tell. For until I am one with Him I can never have true rest nor peace. I can never know it until I am held so close to Him that there is nothing in between.
Years ago when My Mum was young and vigorous, she had said to me that when she died she would become a Guardian Angel.
I reminded her of this, during the week she was dying, perhaps to encourage her as much as to comfort me. “Remember, you are going to be my Guardian angel.”
When Mum died, my grief was gentle, perhaps because I still felt she was with me. Losing Willow, the pain was much more raw.
I think you were my Guardian angel Mum when the grief was at its worst, when I felt inconsolable with loss. Your little booklet brought me the hope, and renewed faith that I needed. Your love shone through by showing me that page. We are connected through the origin of Love in our amazing incomprehensible God in Three Persons.
Our lovely little Mum died on the evening of 23 December 2023.
Heather Mary
Our lovely little elderly black and white cat Willow is going the same way as he becomes quieter, eating and drinking less, staying in our spare bedroom, hardly moving a muscle.
Willow
I feel at a loss and drifting in an unknowable sea, broken hearted at losing these loved ones so close together.
Lent started this year on 22 February, Ash Wednesday. I read the poem “Lent” on Friday 24 February (Post published 08 March 2023)
That Friday I was in a horrible mood from the moment I clambered out of bed, late morning; angry with everything and everyone. I was weary and totally fed up.
I am the main carer for my frail elderly mother, Heather, who came to live with us, my husband and I, in July 2020.
We were not able to visit Mum when the lockdown for coronavirus started in England, March 2020. When we finally saw her in her own flat, about 6 weeks later, she looked self neglected and desperately lonely; sitting in the semi darkness with curtains half drawn and wearing clothes dirty with days’ of food spillages. She had sounded ok on the telephone, her only means of communication with the outside world, apart from her twice daily formal carers.
Then in June 2020, her beloved elder brother died of a covid related illness. He had been admitted to hospital and had caught covid in hospital. Despite living at opposite ends of the country, Heather and her brother spoke every week on the telephone. The day he died, Mum became confused. Over the next few days; she had several falls, rang me unsure of how to climb into her bed at night, left her door unlocked and was generally frightened. Finally she was taken into hospital.
There was a choice; for her to move from hospital into a Nursing Home for rehabilitation or to come to stay with us. Elderly people were dying like swatted flies in Nursing Homes, including the one proposed. She came to live with us.
As soon as Mum came to our home, I became her full time carer. It was a steep learning curve. Initially I was off sick from work, until I decided I needed to retire early in November 2020. A wise colleague warned me that it can be overwhelming and exhausting caring for someone who is completely dependent on you.
Initially, she gained ground, then Mum’s health declined again in the summer of 2022. This time her elder sister had died. Not of a covid related illness this time, just old age. Her little sister Heather pleaded with her not to leave her on her own. Now, Mum is the only sibling left.
Mum no longer has the strength to walk. Now she is based on the ground floor of our home and we have equipment to help transfer Mum. My husband helps with the transfers. We enlarged the downstairs toilet for her personal care.
When Mum first moved here, naively I thought of the Gran in the film Billie Elliot and thought Mum would just be an extra member of the household and fit in with us. It is not quite like that. Our lives revolve around Mum and her care needs.
And yet…I wouldn’t have her live anywhere else.
I chose…we chose to care for my mum. We want her to be here; to be alive. So what has happened? Why was I in such a bad mood?
In recent weeks, I have tried to do a little more in the community. In the height of the pandemic, everyone was restricted in what they could do. In that sense it was companionable. Now, others are going out and about freely as before the pandemic. My husband and I are still limited in how much we can leave the house. We only dash out for an hour except on the afternoons we have arranged for a companionship carer. Even then we need to return for toileting and at set times.
In December, I had started to get involved in one or two projects in the community, the Patient Participation Group for our local General Practice and another voluntary group, Accessible Todmorden Forum.
Meeting others I was finding it so hard. I was over emotional, interrupting, argumentative. If people simply ignored my ideas or worse, poured scorn on them, I was furious inside. Sometimes I let it show. I was feeling out of step with my co-volunteers. I needed them to totally agree with me. I was cross with anybody outside the little bubble of my household, and even with those within my little bubble too.
That Friday in an emotional huff I went for a walk. I looked at the trees. The poem made me wonder, do we need these bleak and empty branches to reveal the gaps in between them? Like the poem states, “lest we should miss the stars”
How can I appreciate this stripped back seemingly barren time?
I first created this Blog because I was running a series of Reflections for Lent in March 2014. I decided to see if I could reach a wider audience.
Here I met you, my friends in the virtual world.
A small number of people, like the small number who listened and shared with me in the “real’ world. It doesn’t matter. The numbers I mean.
Where two or three are gathered together, that is where God is. That is my prayer.
Reflecting and creating my Blog helped me. I hope it also helps you.
The series of Reflections were inspired by the poetry in the book of poems complied and explored by Janet Morley, the heart’s time. A poem a day for Lent and Easter. (First Published in Great Britain in 2011.)
It is several years since I have written… Many, many distractions.
Nine years later I have returned to the book again. This time, our Minister, Rev Kathie Heathcoat is leading the Lent group based on this book of poems. I join it by zoom.
Remembrance Sunday 2018 and remembering my grandfather Herbert Down:
I found a thin sacred space on Remembrance Sunday last year. As you know it was the 100-year Anniversary of the end of the First World War. It was the last time for me to walk on the parade as one of the local Town Councillors. I wanted to wear a white poppy symbolizing peace in addition to a red one. Some of the trappings of Remembrance trouble me. Can they sometimes be used to glorify war and heighten nationalistic tensions? And yet the white poppy is controversial in Todmorden. A previous Town Councillor had a horrible time when he tried to lay down a wreath of white poppies.
We have a new deacon in our church and community and I spoke to him about it. I discovered that he used to work in the Royal Air Force and was part of various wars. He told me that he had decided to wear both a red poppy and a white one.
I wanted to carry a picture of my maternal grandfather in his uniform. He was a conscientious objector in the First World War, not wanting to fight he became a stretcher-bearer on the front line. The white poppy was for him. I had a large black and white photograph size of A4 that I laminated. I could not find a white poppy. However I had some silk and plastic white roses, so I decided to carry the white rose and my grandfather’s photograph. Grandpa didn’t die in the First World War. He was there throughout, seeing the loss of all the other soldiers first hand. He was attached to the Lancashire Fusiliers. Men from Todmorden were part of the Pals Regiments who were also part of the Lancashire Fusiliers. After a long life, Grandpa’s ashes were scattered here on the hillside with Granny’s near our old family home. These were my thoughts and why I wanted to honour him on the parade.
At the time I was full of internal conflict. I had had an altercation with a fellow Town Councillor. The new Chair of the Resident’s Association was walking in the parade. I was still smarting from giving up the Chairmanship, despite my need to let go. I had written out a few prayer stations, which were being used, in our church service that day. One was a prayer asking God to help soften our hearts towards people with whom we are in conflict. I needed to soften my heart.
It was raining solidly, appropriate weather for mourning. We started to march. I held my photograph and white rose, the red poppy on my lapel. More people than usual lined the side of the road along the route. Just as we went into the park I looked directly into the eyes of a woman of about my age in tears at the roadside. My gaze met hers as I tried to convey a sense of comradeship and compassion for whatever was upsetting her.
We came to the garden of Remembrance. An older couple looked at my photograph and urged me forward. I stood beside a woman in a wheelchair as she had a programme with the hymns. Our voices blended in tune and we encouraged each other to sing louder. When it came to laying the wreaths I was pushed forward again. I found myself standing beside a soldier from the Medical Corps. Even the sergeant, who barked out the orders, a hardened military man, said that I had more right to be there than anyone. The stretcher bearers were very brave men. They allowed me to lay down my photograph and flower among the other wreaths that day.
I closed my eyes to a beautiful rendition of Amazing Grace and stood with eyes closed for the two-minute silence. I felt I could touch the poignancy in the atmosphere. It continued to rain. So many of us were completely drenched by now. I walked back behind the band. The rain stopped.
The following day, I decided to go and look at the wreaths and perhaps collect Grandpa’s photograph and flower. I hoped it would still be there. As I walked along the path, I glanced up across the valley where trees and the curve of the opposite hill hid our old family home from sight. I could just see a glimpse of the roof and chimneys of the house and the hillside above it. I was thinking of Granny and Grandpa.
Grandpa’s photograph with white rose was there wedged in between two wreaths. I was so glad it hadn’t been disturbed. I walked a little further on reading the cards with each wreath. A gentle breeze stirred. The photograph was lifted by it and straight into the water of the pond at the foot of monument. Grandpa’s photo was face up, his deep and sincere gaze looking out. It was too far for me to reach
I hunted for a stick in order to reach for it. With the stick I still tried in vain to bring it nearer the edge. A woman came to look at the wreaths and empathized with my plight.
“ The gardeners are just around the corner. They are bound to have a rake or something and will be able to retrieve it. I will go and fetch one of them”
Sure enough she returned with a gardener and a long leaf-collecting shovel. He stood on the small stone wall surrounding the pond and soon easily retrieved my photograph. When he saw that Grandpa was a stretcher-bearer, he exclaimed.
“My grandfather was a stretcher bearer too. He did not want to kill anyone. So that’s what he did to serve in the war. It haunted him forever afterwards. He woke up at night having nightmares about rats.”
I was in awe. It was only a small exchange. And yet, how was it that it was this particular man who came to rescue Grandpa’s photograph? I was so grateful for the kind woman who had helped me find him. I reflected on all the moments of poignancy the previous day.
It seemed as if Someone was there, helping us to meet and exchange understanding beyond words. In each exchange there were moments of comradeship and compassion.
I was left with the following thought. Perhaps there are saints and angels nearer to us than we think, especially when we are drawn to reflect and honour one another.
Soften Our Hearts.
Our hearts are hardened Lord.
Spend a few minutes thinking about the relationships in your life- relationships with family, friends, work colleagues and people within the church community.
Are you struggling with any of these relationships as a result of elements of conflict whether openly expressed or not?
Lift those relationships to God, asking for Him to help you with them, for Him to re-create your heart and fill it with His compassion.
Pray that He will renew your heart with a right spirit towards those involved.
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me (Psalm 51:10).
Make a heart shape out of the tough modeling clay; praying as you do that God will soften your heart towards Him, towards those around you and those caught in conflict around the world.
Do you know what you are looking for? When you think of your life’s ambitions what do you dream of doing?
Do you want to be that one person who can make all the difference- that fantastic cricket player that saves the Ashes; the brilliant singer who has been on top with his music sales for several years; or that charismatic politician who wins the day in the Brexit talks?
In contrast, when Jesus talks about seeking the kingdom of heaven, what is he talking about?
His meanings are hidden in parables.
The Parable of the Hidden Treasure 44 “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.
The Parable of the Pearl of Great Value 45 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, 46 who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.
Matthew 13:44-46 English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK)
Is it crazy to sell everything we have for just one “pearl” of great value? Alternatively why sell everything to buy one field for the treasure hidden within it? Will we spend a lifetime digging up that same field to find it again? Surely that could be a lifetime of effort ending up in frustration and futility?
I don’t understand.
Bob Stoner in his blog “ where do you store your treasure?” writes more about this.
He suggests that the treasure is not what is important; it is where it is stored that is of importance.
I still don’t understand.
Some parables I do understand and identify with easily. For example, I identify with the parables Jesus gives about losing and finding things.
The Parable of the Lost Sheep: Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”
3 So he told them this parable: 4 “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? 5 And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. 6 And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbours, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ 7 Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Luke 15:1-7 English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK)
Time and motion studies would not commend the shepherd for deserting his ninety-nine obedient sheep, and go off looking for that one sheep that has got itself into trouble. What a complete waste of time and resources in this age where time is money and efficiency and effectiveness is everything.
I lose things, probably nearly every day, especially when I am rushing. I waste eons of time as I hunt high and low retracing my steps searching for keys, purses, books, and my mobile phone. And this is before I can leave the house.
Late one October, 28 years ago, I went with my extended family on a walking holiday in Coniston.
In high spirits on the first evening, after our arrival and receiving the keys for our rooms, my eldest sister Cassie, her two daughters and I ran down a field to the edge of Lake Coniston. It was a beautiful autumn evening.
After gazing out over the lake for a few minutes we walked back up the field to the Holiday Fellowship boarding house. To our dismay we discovered that we had lost one of our room keys. It had fallen from a pocket as we ran. We returned to search. Between us we walked every inch of the field. We returned empty handed. We could not find the key.
Later that evening, when the whole group was gathered, we were given the evening talk about the walks for the following day. We were also instructed that the rule of the House was not to take keys outside. We felt suitably ashamed. The key was lost and not to be found. Fortunately they had a spare.
A few days later, after returning from a day’s walk I glanced again at the field. It was a lovely evening and just before sunset and I was inspired to go back and search again. Head down, eyes glued to the grass, I crisscrossed the field down to the lake. Nothing. There was no key.
I gazed out across the lake for a short while, before returning in the same manner, crisscrossing the field and scouring the grass with my eyes.
At one point I stopped. I realised I was missing the sight of a magnificent sunset behind me. I lifted my head to turn back to look. As I turned, my eyes alighted on something shining in the grass behind me.
It was the lost key.
In stopping to appreciate the world of beauty around me, I found what I was looking for.
Is that the meaning of the parable about treasure hidden in the field?
The joy I felt that evening was more than just admiring a lovely sunset and finding a lost key. To me it was a miracle.
I remember talking to my nieces about it later. I told them if God knows us so intimately with such a little thing like a lost key, how much more will our Loving Holy One be with us when searching for the bigger things in life.
I trusted that evening that I could find the key. Yet the way that I found it was so unexpected. The second I had stopped searching, there it was at my feet as I gazed outwards to God’s beautiful creation.
In that moment I felt I glimpsed the kingdom of heaven. I also glimpsed God’s love for me.
God has met me many times through nature.
When I reflect back I also appreciate God’s compassion for me. I needed the affirmation that I was loved because of what followed afterwards on that holiday. Often a mountain top experience can be followed by a difficult time.
The holiday ended in sadness. We had a blazing family row. I can’t remember what it was about now. All I remember was sadly walking around the grounds at Coniston with my Mum. We were waiting to leave. We had come on the holiday with hopes and high expectation and it had ended up with bitter recriminations.
And yet, twenty eight years later the memory that survives most clearly was the previous moment, standing in the field, the lost key at my feet, and gazing at a spectacular sunset.
It’s been a year now that Mandy & I have been serving in this community. It certainly has been interesting – in a good way I’ll quickly add. My profile, my contract with the church, was to ‘bring presence’ to this town, this community. There wasn’t much extra detail other than our members are reticent […]
Ten years ago today my eldest sister Cassie took her own life in front of a high speed train, stepping off the platform at her local station.
This was one of her poems that I read at her funeral:
Midwinter
Two deer,
In the frosty half light
At the start of the year.
You turn towards me
Shyly.
Startled, you bound away.
Not together but apart.
Make not a bond of love.
I alone,
Yet not lonely
In the soft winter darkness,
Waiting for the dawn light.
Carolyn Zachary
My poems of reply after her funeral:
The Butterfly
As we stepped out of the Church,
At the end of your funeral,
We breathed in the fresh scent of pine.
That endless torrent of grey rain
Had stopped.
A butterfly circling
Above the altar;
Tears crowded my eyes
So I failed to see
The freed spirit of you
Our sister Cassie
Making your journey
Heavenward.
Beloved by God
(And us)
You had stated
An act of Love is never wasted.
Yet make not a bond of Love
You said,
Which boldly I read out
From your poem, Midwinter.
Can we listen?
Can we still hear your voice?
And feel your passionate care
For all of us here,
Still living?
We would be so wise
To continue to heed those words
Written by you
In former times
And respectfully
Take our cue from them;
Than to dwell eternally
On our sudden and aching loss.
By Julia Coughlan (September 2009)
Look very carefully and you might see a butterfly
Autumnal Breezes
I glanced up at my favourite hillside
Behind my parent’s home.
Fine golden grasses
Are rippled with sunlight
Like the sleek ginger fur
On the nape of Sheena’s neck
Are ruffled by a giant hand.
Our dog Sheena
The grasses are softly caressed
By that buffeting brute
Standing all on end in swift succession
Then flattening against the green/brown bank.
Autumn sun gleams on their silken tresses
As it speeds by on the violent gusts.
Shade and light
Both there in alternate seconds
At the winds violent passing.
Watch how it rages up the hill
As it raises us up
Then flattens us down against the hard ground
And we vanish without a trace.
Just as a life
There one minute
And lost in the next.
Yet beauty remains
As a butterfly stretches out its wings
Poised and sheltered
Basking in the late summer sun.
By Julia Coughlan (September 2009)
Forever close to us in our thoughts and love and your care too for us.
Martha… Always busy, busy doing Raising money, baking cakes Calling door to door for Christian Aid Giving lifts to the young and elderly Being part of the coffee rota The flower rota The counting of money And giving of money To keep the Church going A few stalwarts baling water To keep it afloat Growing ever more Resentful Petty and petulant Until exhausted with our efforts Of doing our duty (over years) To others And to God We collapse Yet limp on… Under the strain
If I decide to come to your Church Please let me be…
Mary…
Seated
Quiet
Still
Listening to his voice
Wondering at his words
Marveling at his unusual wisdom
Apparently doing
Absolutely
Nothing
Except
Being
Here
Close to Jesus
Gaining courage
For a tricky week ahead
But then I hear a rustle…
Martha is
Limping in behind me
And I become restless
And guilt-stricken
Needing to move
To help
Or hinder
And sometimes retreat altogether…
How would the Church survive If we are always Mary not Martha?
Yet on that particular occasion Jesus said Mary chose the better way. (Luke 10:38-42)
Perhaps if all the Martha’s
In the Church Could be…
Like Mary
And the Mary’s
When the pace is right Act…
Like Martha
Perhaps then We could renew our strength. And soar on wings like eagles Run and not grow weary Walk and not be faint?
He leads me beside a moorland stream 
