So, it's been a year since I received that call from the Cheney (Wash.) Care Center telling me my father, Robert Sr., had passed away.
On Friday, I woke up, showered, dressed and went to my icon corner. Lit candles, set incense aflame, and recited the morning prayers of the Orthodox Christian. Then, placing a portrait of Dad on the ledge under an icon of the Theotokos, I opened a booklet containing the Akathist for the Departed and began to repeat the ancient words.
For the 40 days following Dad's death on Jan. 17, 2019, this is the prayer I offered for his "repose." Though he was not Orthodox (Dad was a retired Pentecostal Evangelical pastor), I had the blessing of my parish priest to do this; and I found in the prayer's ancient prose and, to me truth, comfort as the tears flowed then.
It was the same on Friday.
The emotions were sweeter, a year later. Oh, still grief, but with less emotional guilt baggage. Time does not heal all wounds, you see -- that's a well-intentioned lie we tell each other. But Time does lessen the pain of the scars of loss. . . and memories can flow of loving moments shared.
There were more tears of the former kind, than the latter.
In six months, I'll be turning again to the Akathist prayer for Mom, who died six months after Dad, also at Cheney Care Center. Alzheimer's had robbed her of speech, memory and mobility long before she passed away. But there are also precious memories left to me of her better days, her loving moments.
Does it sound delusional to say I felt Dad's presence during Friday's prayers? OK, but I did, and he was like a sweet perfume born on the cloud of Light warming my heart. I glowed within as I breathed the words of devotion and petition repeated from the lips of millions of mourners, by ancestors in faith, over the past two millennia, in languages both current and lost.
I anticipate that comfort, and mystical assurance of faith, when I pray again for Mom's soul, and our future reunion.
"At Thy breath flowers come to life, the river Nile is resurrected and a multitude
of tiny creatures awakens.
"Thy glance is brighter than the spring sky; and Thy love, O Jesus,
is warmer than the rays of the sun.
Thou didst raise our mortal human flesh
from the dust of the earth unto the blossoming of the eternal spring
of incorruptible life.
Do Thou then illumine also Thy servant Robert Sr. with the light of Thy mercy."
