In That Moment

Little sweetheart, I want to tell you a little about my great grandma. I was thinking of her last night. Her name was Pearl. She was my mom's dad's mom. The mother of my namesake, Louis or "Louie" who I've often told you would be a real kindred spirit of yours and love you almost as much as I.

Pearl was a very spirited and independent woman. Her story is kind of amazing and I think you'd really love her, too. She was married to a man before she married her second husband. And that's what I want to tell you about.

She was married when she was 19 to a man named Hiriam. He was older, in his 40's. They found each other and fell deeply in love. They both kind of left behind the lives they'd known before just to be with each other. She had my grandfather with him - Louie's first name is actually Hiriam. Louis is his middle name. He started going by Lou or Louie as a kid and it stuck but he was named for Hiriam.

Tragically, not long after my grandpa was born Hiriam died suddenly. And terribly, cruelly his family took him away. They wouldn't even let Pearl go to the funeral. In her grief she was so alone, my little sweetheart. She'd run away to be with him and when he died she was alone with a baby and nowhere to go and only 19. It was a very moralist era and Pearl had to find a way to go on and take care of little Hiriam Louis. She had to find and marry someone else and she did. She found another man who was kind, a little odd as I remember, but kind to her and that was what mattered. He came to the marriage with two kids of his own. Pearl raised them all as a family and took care of them. Incredibly, I can't remember his first name. He was still alive when I was a little boy. He died when I was about 7, I think. But Pearl lived until I was a teenager.

She was a tough old cookie. Like I said, I think you'd really like her. My grandpa ran a hotel on Lake Eire when I was a kid and the whole family would go down there during the season - like June through August, like Memorial Day to Labor Day (which is today and maybe why I'm thinking of it) - and kind of man the ship. Louie was an amazing baker and would run the kitchen and cafeteria. My mom and grandma would pitch in. Even I "worked" in the salad room (like away from all the knives or anything where a little boy might get hurt). And Pearl was always at Reception. She was kind of like the concierge.

She got around really well and was in terrific health living on her own until she fell one winter on some icy steps clearing her back porch and broke a kneecap. I remember her funeral. It was the first one I ever went to. I wasn't there when she passed away but I remember hearing about it. In her last hours she called out to Hiriam, to her first husband, to her true love. She never forgot him.

And I've never forgotten that story. It was my mom who told it to me. Little sweetheart, I think in that moment Pearl saw Hiriam, saw her true love and that he took her with him and they were together again and forever. I think it was one of those moments where we, only mortal, have a half-glimpse witness of the eternal and see or maybe more in this case hear how close The Forever is as someone is called from this realm into the next.

I love the idea that Pearl's true love appeared to her and took her home with him in those moments. And, little sweetheart, so desperately sad and lonely for you today, I pray that you will come for me in the same way, as soon as Heaven will allow. I believe and pray for exactly that. Please help strengthen my faith, help me be kind and good and take me to you soon, won't you my love? Until that day! Until that day...