We drove to the Congregational church under a patterned gray sky, the perfect compliment to the scattered yellow leaves that waved us up a narrow lane. We were about to give our respects to a friend’s father, a true Vermonter and beloved member of a tiny farming town.
I had only met my friend’s father for a brief moment before he died — a charming man with a “salt of the earth” face — but I recall kind eyes and how he adored his only child, my friend who eulogized him so eloquently that we were all left stunned by her words of love for family, his community and the land.
As we drove home after the church supper, I said to my companion, “If the major thing that people remembered about my legacy was a love of flowers, I’d be a happy woman.”
It’s all about love.
Love is borne as much as it is taught. I realized this yesterday as I watched my friend embrace every person with equal care and attention, continuing her father’s legacy.
Perhaps for some, loving isn’t so easy. Maybe they’ve never been able to overcome their rage or regret. Maybe their love shines towards animals or through words that heal. A casual touch that helps another forget their suffering for a few moments. Release spiders rather than kill them. Walk away with finality from chaos not their own.
Perhaps the best way one may love is to drive up a mountain road, roll down the window and yell, I love you! Always be here! — grateful to be a part of such magnificence.
No one might see these moments, but they remain part of our legacy.
Perhaps legacy is learning where we love best. It’s loving places and things and people without struggle. It’s growing comfortable in the softest places of our soul, and to shine in such a manner that the brightness can’t help but remain once we step out of this form. Our brightness — without discarding the memory of a painful existence — becomes part of our beautiful country, the enduring birthright.