It’s raining. A rare occurrence of late. And a welcome one. It’s done that off and on for the last few days, and you know what? The grass that once crunched under my feet is now soft and green again. And in need of mowing. The trees that were covering my yard with a layer of leaves have hit pause on their shedding. The world is coming to life again, as though Summer suddenly realized she had a few more days left in her, even if the calendar says otherwise.
But very soon that will all change, and the amount of rain that does or does not fall will have little influence over Mother Nature’s timetable. Based on a variety of scientific circumstances that we won’t delve into here, the grass will grow brown and crunchy once more, the trees will put on their glorious cloaks of red and yellow and gold before becoming stark silhouettes of bare branches stretching into the sky. Fall will fall then hastily retreat into Winter when the world sleeps.
It’s almost as if Nature wanted to give us one last glimpse of her beauty before exchanging it for the cold gray days ahead—days that can still be beautiful, but in a very different kind of way.
Do you realize that sometimes, people are like that?
As I ponder the dance between Life and Death, in this instance my mother comes to mind. The day she died was one of the best days she’d had in quite some time. She ate a good lunch. She visited with family and actually seemed more like her old self, something we had not seen since she’d been hospitalized several weeks before. All in all, we believed things were looking up. But that evening I received a frantic call from the wonderful lady who stayed with her at night—a call telling me to come quickly. If I hadn’t been working late and already in the building, I would not have been there when she died.
I’m sure many of you could tell a similar story. When that last good day was followed by a final good-bye. An unexpected one at that, due to the false hope offered by momentary improvement. Life can surge unexpectedly before it bids us farewell, just like the greening of the grass after a much-needed rain. It’s a welcome respite, even though we know what lies ahead.
About the author: Lisa Shackelford Thomas is a fourth-generation member of a family that’s been in funeral service since 1926 and has worked with Shackelford Funeral Directors in Savannah, Tennessee for over 45 years. Any opinions expressed here are hers and hers alone and may or may not reflect the opinions of other Shackelford family members or staff.
