Priceless

We just passed the 20th anniversary of the attack on America that changed ( in some way) every single person I've ever talked to; at least those souls old enough to remember that something shifted here in this life amid the loss.

And then, of course, those personally affected were altered forevermore in ways one will never understand unless their pathway suddenly turns onto the road that nobody wants to walk. Otherwise, we stand in the wings and hand out all we have to give; compassion.

Sept 11, 2001. It was autumn, my favorite season.

I've often wondered, in my own life, why so many of my pivital moments seem to have happened in autumn when the land turns itself over to red and gold - for the briefest space of time - before letting go. When all feels quiet and dormant; like waiting for some mystery to be revealed that could be beautiful, or not.

This year on Sept 11, 2021 - like so many others around the world - I lay in bed sick with covid. Another attack on life, globally, that has lasted almost 2 years now.

Barely able to hold my head up or eyes open (I listened more than watched) a Netflix documentary called "What is A Life Worth?" in regards to placing a price tag on compensation payments for the victims families of 9/11.

The question, "What should that monetary number be?"

What is a life worth, after all?

While I lay in bed on day 10 of Covid, literally feeling my body fighting to survive the most foreign invasion, I prayed for the simplest of things.

I prayed that a drink of water I needed would make it to my lips and not burn my throat or cause me nausea to the point of throwing up all over the comforter that my husband would ultimately end up cleaning. I did not want to burden him more in all his goodness as a caretaker.

I prayed my cough would stop before I lost my breath altogether.

I prayed for strength to walk across my bedroom, to the bathroom, and not fall.

I prayed for the irrational thoughts in my head to clear, so I could concentrate on healing.

By day 18 of covid my body began the stages of turning a corner and I gave in to the floating sensation of someone greater than I attempting to ground me. It was as if discovering land for the first time.

What is a life worth? Whether it is a life stepping forward to help their fellow man on 9/11, or another who was simply walking the streets of New York City on a morning that would end up changing their loved ones lives forever, or me lying on a bed struggling to overcome covid while my husband (weary eyes behind his masked face) sat in mumbled prayer.

There is just no number worthy enough to place on a life. We are each important to a handful of people who know our story or walked out our story with us. Those who feel our words before we speak. Those who know our silence is not really so empty, but filled with all the tears that have no place to go when you are down and out. Pooled at our feet and dried by someone who knows there is no number.

No number when your eyes are closed and the one who loves you strokes your fingers, brings you tea and places his head upon your knee to remember this life you've built together. Remembers to tell you that you're strong, that your needed. Priceless.

No number for the victims of 9/11, high in the air on a plane going down - choosing to be hero's. Running into burning buildings to save the lives of people they did not know; strangers holding each other up, to the end.

How do you possibly decide what it's all worth to their families?

I picture each of us with a tag hanging from our hat like Minnie Pearl (you might want to look up that name ;) but the tag has no numbers, no price. How can it? Priceless.

When it was over; when days passed on from that September day and families ate breakfast together again, minus one. When feet walked through the dust and debris up and down the streets of Manhattan - reminders of bodies turning back from whence they came - we remember what was important after all.

We remember that we forgot to kiss someone the last time we saw them.

We remember speaking harshly when we could have taken a deep breath first.

We remember playing ball for only a few minutes just because we couldn't wait to have our own space at the end of a day.

We remember how the Barbie dolls were lined up for a fashion show but there was dinner to make and bills to pay.

We remember the times we could have said "yes" instead of "no"

We remember that we forgot to linger.

And we Forgot - for a moment - that Life is Priceless.

But not today. Today I am changed, once again, in the autumn.

The effects of covid have taken a toll and each day I stand in my backyard just to breath in and out. I'm so grateful the simple things I prayed for over the weeks of illness, I am now privileged to be living out under the canopy of sunshine weaving it's web through these autumn trees. The light streams between Firs and Maples like a cloak sent down to cover my heart; a sweet balm for me alone to feel in the stillness of this yard that is my life.

And I dream backwards to another autumn when this grass of velvet green rolled out before me now was barren soil laced with red clay dirt that had no hope. I was younger then and standing in the middle of time - innocently wishing for flowers to magically create the perfection I desired.

Wishing for nature and life to hurry up.

Instead, there was a little boy playing contentedly in rivers of rainwater squiggling throughout the muddied land where one day in the far future he would run laughing on fields of green. I still see him squatting there unaware there were seeds to spread and take root among the debris of life that would show up; showing him - showing us - over so many years and seasons how to live and die and live again.

Those were the important lessons before us all that we could not know then. Lessons that every autumn is busy teaching, even when we don't understand what we're learning. They are the things one can never explain, right? Beneath the surface of life, lays the mystery of starting with a gift you did not understand was a gift at all. It's only in the passing of years where answers are released with age and you realize what you had all along was priceless.

We moved into this house in November of 1999. Just after my father passed and a couple of years before the sadness of Sept 11. We cried at my fathers bedside and we cried watching the towers fall. We grieved my father and we grieved with an entire country and somehow life kept marching forward all the same.

Our family grew and we grew - despite loss. Time stopped for no one.

Eventually this house became a home and the property popped with color - changing the landscape of muddied rivers, a tired mama, and a little boy that grew into a man. All these years later it showcases the seasons of growth we loved and others which ended up in a compost pile. I think its okay to leave some of those moments right there; to remember the new soil which came forth was only because of the hard moments and how remarkable that really is.

I turned 60 this past August and it looks like we may be driving away from this place that cocooned me and those I've loved in the autumn of my life. Not so surprising, really. Older, softer and a bit more gentle; somehow it seems just right. For it was autumn when we drove up this driveway long ago, with rain bouncing off the paved blacktop scattered with yellow leaves. The years spread out before us then, like so many tables we would set with vases of flowers and brightly colored dishes on a carpet of green.

My mind is a blur of smiling faces, smells of freshly mowed grass, sounds of a crackling fire pit with warm brandy and so, so many stories. All the souls who took a seat, raised a glass and made us better with their love and raw honest insight on the heart of life, showed us right here in this place the priceless touch of the human spirit. And we'll raise our glass - no matter where we land - to you and who we became because of you.

You helped us make this house a home.

It was a new beginning then; new unknowns. Just as it will be when we drive away down the hill. And when we do, I'll look back. Because that's what I do best. Even if it makes me sad, even if it makes me cry. I look back. At my childhood, my own children, and all those I loved who have passed. At my mistakes, regrets, growth and all the joy.

And I've learned not to apologize for looking back because every single thing - beautiful or ugly - built me. Those are the things we should not want to forget; how we are changed by everything.

Cancer, accidents, mass shootings.

Divorce, birth, death.

The horrors of 9/11. Covid.

Any change of heart that's worth anything came from events in life (personally or globally) simply because they happened. Our world is tweaked and we begin to mark the moments we were altered; hopefully seeing our greater purpose at being through a new lense.

So, I'll look back. Until my house with the stairs leading to the chubby porch that holds a purple door which beckoned others forward as if the walls themselves had the ability to embrace, fades away from view.

I'll look back until somebody else stands on that threshold, holding the key and slipping it into the lock of new beginnings. And I will smile to know that here in this place I once called home, their life memories and stories will carry on. Also being - in their own right - priceless.

Thank you for reading!

If you enjoyed my last book "If I Saw You on Sunday" which was a fundraiser for a school in Mexico, I am currently working towards another book of my collective writings and have joined Vocal to help with the cost.

If you enjoyed the story enough to feel like adding to the "Tip" jar for my next endeavor, thank you & know I am ever grateful!

If you are here just simply enjoying a read, I am ever grateful for the support.

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Salud!