There are moments when time stands still, moments when the earth seems to stop revolving on its’ axis, when the sun disappears from the sky, the stars are extinguished and the moon drops into the abyss of a far off universe; times when the air we breath ceases to exist as we hold our breath, waiting, just waiting. There are moments frozen in time and burned into the personal history of our lives.

But we live with courage and we survive, changed forever but going forward for those who cannot

Some years ago, I had written a piece about living our lives in moments, some wonderful beyond compare and others that could shatter the universe in which we live.  There was a woman in our group known by the name of “Wee Granny Mush” and after publishing my thoughts on moments, she told me about hers – when she was sitting by her daughter’s bed, holding her hand as her adult child died.  As her daughter took her final breath, Wee Granny Mush felt a light squeeze to her hand, the final earthly connection between mother and child.

It was that thought, that image which led me to write about moments when time stands still.  It was meant for Wee Granny Mush but we all have them at some time in our lives, some dramatic and others less so but no less impactful.  My own came when my father died in my arms just a few short weeks after my mother had died.  As I held my dad as he was dying I cried “Daddy don’t leave me.”  Of course he did and at 52 years old, I became an orphan.