My Heavenly Valentine
Almost from the moment I learned of my youngest son Michael’s death, I began hearing his voice and receiving signs that made all of the difference in my ability to heal my grief and move into grace. “To live in a state of grace means to be fully in tune with your spiritual nature and a higher power that sustains you.” I pulled this quote from a book entitled, If Life is a Game, These are the Rules, by Cherie Carter-Scott. This definition of grace caught my heart, as the title to my own book is “From Grief to Grace…A Mother’s Journey.”
On 2/11, I had couple of heavenly valentines from my beloved angel son. First, I noticed what looked like a tiny heart on the floor in my bedroom. When I looked more closely, it was a piece of folded paper. I smiled, said, “Hello Michael,” and headed for my shower. Next, as I was pulling a camisole shirt out of my armoire, I noticed a blinking colored light in a small cardboard box on the corner bottom shelf. It’s my little “junk box” where I keep my various Rotary pins, safety pins, buttons, and other “collectibles.” I lifted the piece of fabric that I stick my Rotary pins into, curious to see what in the world the blinking was all about. A golden heart pin popped out and landed right at my feet. I do not remember this heart pin, where it came from, or how it ended up in my box of pins and buttons. I laughed and said “I love you, Michael.”
Still puzzled by this flashing colored light coming from under the pins, I started digging and found a small metal cylinder inside of a tiny plastic bag, just flashing madly in multiple colors, like one of those squeeze rings made out of rubber. However, it wasn’t a squeeze ring, and turning it off wasn’t so easy. Several minutes later, after much scrutiny under a bright lamp with my cheater glasses, I finally figured out that turning it off required a quarter turn of the top. And, if I didn’t turn it far enough, the blinking would stop for a moment and then start up again. Clearly it wasn’t a matter of bumping it on or off.
An Early Valentine from Heaven
As far as I’m concerned, Michael just gave me my Happy Valentine three days early. When I took the time to closely examine the heart, I could see a raised engraving of a small hand reaching from the top right down to a larger hand reaching up from the lower left and both are touching a tiny heart in the middle. If I had not been tuned in and open to messages from my son, all of this would have been missed. I am so grateful that I began paying attention to signs from Michael the moment I knew he had passed. It has made all the difference.
Living in a State of Grace
I believe my own sense of grace comes from paying attention to the magical and mystical each moment that I can remember to do so. It is the mystery and joy that sustains me as I walk this journey as an “angel mom,” my term for those of us who have angel children who have passed from this physical world.