Dunbar Memorial Garden

Among the "sad mom and dad" club of which noone wants to be a member, there is a plethora of advice shared about those "hardest" dates. Birthdays and the day that marked the end of our old normal lives. We are told to plan something, anything and then have a backup plan that includes the potential of simply falling into a puddle of our own tears.
Everyone is different, everyone reacts in their own way. Everyone is allowed to do whatever it is that will simply help get through that day.

I planned to work at the garden on April 18th - the date of Jesse's accident and had every intention of simply wearing myself out pulling weeds, digging plants. I didn't have a "Plan B."

Many weeks ago, April and I had bumped into Colleen - a former classmate from both Leestown Middle and Dunbar High, a friend of Jesse's who had travelled with us to Italy in 2004. We distracted her from her work and discussed her upcoming graduation as a massage therapist. She gave me her clinic schedule and I had every intention of calling for an appointment but it was just one more thing on my list of "to-do's" that fell between the cracks. When I finally remembered, the only date Colleen had available according the receptionist was April 18th. After a long pause I took it - there was something fortuitous about that being her "only opening."

On the way to my appointment, Linda called - she's been a great friend to the garden posting information of our work in the Dunbar Enews among so many other things. She's become a great friend period. Her son needed some community service hours and she wondered if I might be at the garden later in the day. She turned my attention, handed me a distraction and I am thankful for that call because as I entered the Lexington Healing Arts Academy, I was able to do so without tears.

Colleen performed miraculous work - she had a box of Kleenex at the ready but I think because of her connection to Jesse - I didn't need it. We talked some while she worked and she pinpointed the muscle in my back causing me the most pain and wrote down notes and suggestions. As I left she told me to drink more water and handed me a card with explicit instructions not to read it until I got home.

As I started gathering up the gear to take to the garden April appeared. She helped me pack up then we both drove out to Dunbar. A beautiful chalk drawing on the sidewalk greeted us - Jesse's name and how he will never be forgotten. Adults could stand to learn a few things from their younger counterparts. Compassion as an act, instead of an afterthought.

We'd barely begun work when others started arriving. Linda and her son pulled a boat load of weeds, then pruned back the remainder of the grasses. They also did a bit of correcting of the wooden benches while others came by. As the day progressed, Sarah and James came to help as did Jesse's best friend Jon. Joyce, having helped Jerome with the Mindtriggerz Training lab all morning showed up in time to remind me of all the butterflies we'd seen last summer. She asked about the butterfly milkweed and I showed her the marker for it but said "I just haven't seen it emerging yet" - so we both bent to the ground and I uncovered some mulch and there it was: bright green tendrils stretching for the sky.

Sarah helped me dig sunflowers for a potential native plant sale, April cleaned all the picnic tables with the help of James. I saw them sitting in the shade, backs propped against the school building and wondered at how many times Jesse might have done the same and Hannah. We worked and stopped and started and stopped again and they got me through the day. They touched me and patted me when I cried and they ran through the garden with wild abandon on such a particularly beautiful day at such a particularly beautiful place. They laughed and goofed off. They remembered.

The garden is a safe place for them as it is for me. It continues to be our labor of love no matter who shows up to work or even why. Whether they knew Josh or Jesse or Hannah or Ross or any of the other great kids who surely must surround us somehow while we are there because it's never been a sad place to be. It is "our place" to be. Every day we are there it's even more beautiful. Every day we are there together it is a comfort. With every weed we pull and all the mulch we move and every silly thing that's said, we remember. That is the thing that makes it worth the labor. That we always remember, and care enough to do so together.

When all that is the culmination of our memories and love gather in one specific space, there are no words to describe it. The flowers return along wtih the butterflies and birds and bees. And the people - that's the best part, the people who might continue the work of those who left us too soon.

They are loved. Never forgotten. And one day I will have my flashing lolcube for Jesse. One day.
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