Open to Hope posted my essay “Merry Go Round and Round” on January 22, 2024. I find winter a quiet relief after months of holidays and remembrances. The carousel of time is unstoppable, but I can give myself permission to hop on and off. “Paint was peeling from the horses and the roof was sun-bleached, …
I was honored that Motherwell magazine included my essay written as a letter to Mack. “Your blue camo backpack hung on the back of your desk chair with your Pittsburgh Penguins baseball cap on top of it for eight years. It was as you left it on the last day of school before the Christmas …
In June 2023 I completed the certificate program in the Author Academy, which is offered through the Carnegie Center for Literacy & Learning. The 2022-23 course was a rich experience of regular classes, workshops, and opportunities to receive and give feedback. The highlight for me was working with my mentor, Leatha Kendrick, who is a …
My latest essay ‘About Your Room’ is linked here on Open to Hope. It is written as a letter to Mack when we dismantled his room. Open to Hope is a terrific website packed with helpful articles and podcasts for all types of grief. They help to teach us a new language and way of …
The Compassionate Friends posted my essay today for the many of us who experience a continuing relationship with our dead loved ones with gratitude instead of fear.
There is a lighted “H” on the hospital’s helicopter tower that cuts through fog and snow and brightens summer nights. I see it from different angles, in each season, driving in and out of town. It is from that tower that Mack lifted off on New Year’s Eve 2012 for Hershey Children’s Hospital. “I’m going …
My new essay was posted today on Open to Hope reflecting on the season of Advent and showing up for one another in our darkest hours. I love this quote from Sister Joan Chittister: “Have you never been imprisoned by your fears, your embarrassments, your humiliations, your inadequacies? Because if you have, you know that …
Some thoughts as we enter the season of remembrance. Read it in full here. I have come to appreciate that memory lives in a separate space and at times Mack and I share a moment. Often I laugh out loud and “re-member” Mack’s great laugh and feel his warm spirit because we always laughed together. As …
An essay from Elizabeth recently posted on OpenToHope.com. It has been six and a half years since our son, Mack, died suddenly on New Year’s Eve 2012, just shy of his ninth birthday. As the many of us who learn to live newly after loss, we take it on as a part of our lives and …