No Blank Pages

Casey, filling in all the pages of her book.

I attended a celebration of life service on Zoom for my dearest friend, Casey, this past weekend. Her bonus father said something that I found myself scurrying around to find pen and paper to write down. What I copied was:

In the book of Casey, there are no blank pages.

What is so utterly amazing, and goose bump producing is that this was how I fully experienced Casey. An extremely wise eleven going on twelve year old. She was in my first class of sixth graders that I taught after having been in the classroom with second and fourth graders.

Her nose was always in a book! Being the one who had read every single one I suggested we might read aloud for story time. Not missing too many an eye rolling moment when asking this voracious reader to please leave her book in class, rather than taking it out to recess.

My goal was to assist and encourage the children to try to socialize at recess, and believe it or not, recess was not a favorite time for all of them.

Not my own two children who often shared with huge grins on their faces that recess was their best subject.

Casey was vigilant with her health, trying to remain one step ahead. She had preventative surgeries through the years because she was BRCA positive.

She wrote on her Facebook page, last October, “It’s official. You are looking at a future cancer survivor. It’s Stage 4 pancreatic cancer that has metastasized to the liver and duodenum. I had been doing such a great job monitoring and trying to prevent the BRCA gene mutation from being manifest in my breasts and ovaries, that not once did I worry about my pancreas.”

At the tender age of forty-seven, a gifted teacher impacting the lives of hundreds of children for twenty-two years to not still be earth side is incomprehensible.

Casey, profoundly loved, cherished, and respected by every community she found herself participating within. Her family, school, faith, friendships, the list is ongoing. A superpower of hers is creating lasting friendships wherever she lands.

My heart is crushed, and has been. I’ve been here before, I understand this steep, rocky and uncomfortable terrain all too well. Where to place my energy we shared within our friendship? How to maintain movement, and to keep her memory vibrant and alive within.

I awakened remembering how it felt the day after Douglas’ service. Life continues to go on all around us, yet for those finding themselves inhabiting this newly bereaved, and oh, so foreign land, it feels unfathomable. How can life continue on without our beloved earth side? I have no answers, just lived experience. Somehow it strangely does, leaving us to find our way of which no two will ever be the same.

I am pondering page upon page of the book of Casey. None of them blank. Experiencing and living into such a passionate, full life splashed upon each and every one. I simply wish there were more pages to be written upon, how could I not?

Casey, you are deeply loved and sorely missed. I have no doubt you have found your peeps, are setting up your magical class, and already teaching. Once a teacher always one. This IS a given. Hope we have side by side classrooms when it's my time.

Epitaph

Merrit Malloy

When I die

Give what’s left of me away

To children

And old men that wait to die.

And if you need to cry,

Cry for your brother

Walking the street beside you.

And when you need me,

Put your arms

Around anyone

And give them

What you need to give to me.

I want to leave you something,

Something better

Than words

Or sounds.

Look for me

In the people I’ve known

Or loved,

And if you cannot give me away,

At least let me live on in your eyes

And not your mind.

You can love me most

By letting

Hands touch hands,

By letting bodies touch bodies,

And by letting go

Of children

That need to be free.

Love doesn’t die,

People do.

So, when all that’s left of me

Is love,

Give me away.

*My gratitude for your presence here. If you like what you are reading, clicking on the heart at the bottom of the page helps me get this out into the ethers. Also, your comments are engaging, assisting our community, and please never hesitate if you feel called to pass any along to someone you are thinking of.