Footprints of an Angel

To have a loved one suddenly ripped out of the fabric of ones life is beyond human comprehension. One minute you’re talking to them, hearing all about their day or commiserating over some pitfall they recently experienced. The next nothing. A void so ominous it threatens to engulf your entire being with its deafening silence. But ever so slowly, as the shock slowly subsides, a new reality gently shifts into place. Despite your personal trauma, life has a way of blowing mindlessly through and it’s in these fast paced currents I find myself searching for the memories of Londyn’s presence. Like footprints in the sand leaving behind a temporary proof of existence only to be slowly swallowed up by the ocean of time, so are the memories of our angel.

      Aside from the larger more obvious memories, places forever memorialized in time often captured in pictures, it’s the tinier more non-de script memories, moments that would have otherwise carried no significant meaning, that now seem to jump out at me with every turn. It’s these I now find myself grasping to, like a life jacket in the middle of a raging storm.

      And so I’ve created a catalogue of sorts in my head, a list of all the places big and small where my angel’s footprints can be found. At the top of the staircase where I unknowingly gave Londyn her last huge hug, just days before her accident, reminding her how much she was loved. The birds-eye view from that same staircase, looking down on what used to be her favorite spot to sit, in the front room eating lean cuisines and blueberries and taking the occasional nap. Its the makeup stains that I used to gripe about, smudged into her bedroom floor, now reverently protected as proof of her existence. These same footprints follow me to the grocery store as I pick out her favorite peaches, not too hard/ not too soft. Or the local drug store where I still catch myself automatically reaching for her favorite eyebrow pencils just so she’ll have an emergency set at home. It’s the many, many….many trips made driving her to Pennington Field for band practice and games. Glimpses of our old house as I drive through Bedford or memories of the water park where she learned to swim. The hill where the kids used their boogie boards to sled one unusually snowy winter or the treadmill at the gym, her favorite, and one we used to jokingly fight over. Those same footprints sit beside us in our favorite pew at church where I imagine and remember her involvement in choir and youth. And the last place I ever physically saw her sweet face, driving past me on our street as I was pulling up to the house, waving at me through the windshield of her VW beetle on her way back to Denton. Then, of course, there’s the footprints on my heart, permanent reminders of this beautiful being I got to call mine if only for a little while that has forever changed and molded me into the person I am today.

     It’s these moments and so many more that suddenly seem to crop up everywhere, and as we try to mentally prepare ourselves to observe the one year anniversary of Londyn and Lauren’s passing, it’s almost as if she’s sending me little nudges. Hugs from another plane to let me know she’s with me and she’s ok. I don’t know what the future holds. This, the longest and shortest year of my life, has taught me only one solid truth. That there are no guarantees. To live each day like it’s your last now directs my every action. To be kind and patient regardless of the circumstances because it’s all just small stuff. And yes, despite it all, to find blessings in every day ordinary things. Although she leaves me with some big shoes to fill, I will do everything in my power to keep Londyn’s memory and legacy of kindness alive. She’s already laid the groundwork. All I have to do is follow the footprints of an angel.