Two seemingly abstract, unrelated happenings occurred recently causing me to pause and look for answers, funny how life does that. As a species we look for order and meaning, to find a stasis that settles us. As I reflect on these two events, I am at once dislodged and yet grounded.

It has been twenty-four years since I first journeyed to Baltimore to place my mother’s ashes in the small, oblong hole in the ground. The small grave marker had not yet been placed, so although I approved the artist’s rendering of the stone, I never actually saw it in person.  Some might find it odd, I find it completely expressive of my families travails, that my mother is buried in Baltimore and my father is in upstate New York, over four hundred miles and six and a half hours away. How fitting that they are separated.  He wanted to be with his people, and she with hers, and never the twain shall meet, or at least never to have heaps of dirt shoveled on top of them.  It makes complete sense based on the sham that was our lives growing up, and their marriage.  Because of the distance between their resting places, and I live far from either locale, it’s not likely that I would ever visit. I love the term “resting place”, it sounds so peaceful, like the names of cemeteries created to give those who remain behind some sense of peace.  Names like Oak Lawn, Shady Tree, and Gate of Heaven ushering us into tranquility.

I have twice attempted to find my mother’s grave sight during the last twenty-four years, stopping by Oak Lawn Cemetery on the way home from my annual vacation on Cape Cod, or after a trip to Manhattan. These visits are always an afterthought since I just happen to be driving past Oak Lawn on the way back to Florida on that ghastly North/South corridor known as I-95.  It’s never out of guilt or compunction, just curiosity I imagine. I choose to celebrate the living, and remember the deceased as they were in life. Visiting a cemetery is foreign to me, and I see no need to recall a loved one graveside. But if you’re passing by, why not stop and say “hey”.  After a holiday in New York, I found myself passing through Baltimore just recently, on a cold, gray afternoon, and I decided to pull the car over when I saw the sign for “Oak Lawn Cemetery – East Baltimore’s Best Kept Secret”.  OK now that’s funny. What marketing ignoramus thought that up? Best kept secret?  You have a captive audience, but they’re not going to talk it up. Sheesh.  I remembered mom’s plot was in a section called Knollwood, but I had no number or info to go by.  I searched high and low, over hill and dale, or knoll as the case may be. I meandered past ornate stone monuments with carved angels, and cherubim, never to locate my mother’s headstone. With steely reserve I determined to walk each row and aisle, perusing the weathered headstones, some worn almost smooth with time and the elements.  In the eternal quietness I asked God to lead me to her burial plot so I could just see it, as though He was some Divine GPS unit. The cemetery office was closed so I had no way of figuring out where the gravesite was located. Foiled again. Fifteen years ago, on the way home from another trip, I attempted to locate her headstone but to no avail.  The irony of ever searching and never finding wasn’t lost on me.  Two visits to locate my mother, and zip, nada, nothing. As I grew increasingly cold and frustrated, I realized I could walk for hours and never find it.  I started to think, “that used to be the story of my life, ever searching and never finding”.

The symbolism was ripe. I got back into the car with the proverbial “it wasn’t meant to be”, and drove away shaking my head wondering what it all meant. Trying unsuccessfully on two separate occasions to find my mother’s plot, all I could muster was the thought “that used to be my life”. Searching for who knows what, and searching for fulfillment in places of death. So much of my life was wasted searching for life in things that only bring death and darkness to the soul.  As I drove away from Oak Lawn, the thickening gray clouds still holding in the deeply felt chill, I marveled at God’s restoration and wholeness. I am learning my belovedness.

Another incident occurred shortly after my cemetery excursion. Having received a Christmas package in the mail from an old high school friend, I opened the unexpected gift with warm anticipation. Cloaked in plastic bubble wrap, the mug was a welcome gift.  Sturdy and bright blue with “Blessed” blazoned on it, I quickly christened it with my afternoon caffeinated fix.  Engrossed in a new book and sipping hot coffee make for a pleasurable repast, that is until I noticed the coffee puddle.  My cup of blessing must have cracked during shipping, as my afternoon nectar has seeped down the crack line and formed a pool around the blue base of the mug.  What a shame. My cup of blessing is seeping out, another life metaphor.  Only this time I view the damaged coffee receptacle through the lens of my blessedness. My cup was broken and empty for so long.  That brokenness and emptying made the recent filling possible.  Not all paths are the same, but for me the path to wholeness journeyed round and round the mountain of brokenness. God has filled my cup of blessing during this portion of my journey.  The coffee seeping from the blue mug and pooling at its base doesn’t signify brokenness and loss anymore. It’s emblematic of something much more beautiful in my life.  The Shalom, the wholeness of God is filling me, and by necessity flows out to those around me. I am living life and becoming the person God created me to be, intended me to be, before shame took up residence. My blue coffee mug with the crack and seepage, points me to the healing and restoration that’s occurring in my spirit as a beloved child of God.

Two seemingly abstract and unrelated happenings occurred causing me to pause, and find meaning in the fact that sometimes you search the cemetery looking for life, and drink from cracked mugs with the contents leaking, while being full to the brim with blessing. Funny how life does that.