A Time to Heal

I know you are all wondering why I have not written any blog posts in so long.  I was putting all my writing energy to Toni’s Caring Bridge.  And now that she is gone, I am winding my way back to posting blogs and hopefully, I will pick up on regularly putting out Newsletters again.

This is a good time to subscribe to my blog. It is easiest to see the SUBSCRIBE button from a laptop. When you subscribe, my blog posts will be sent to your email inbox.

It’s been a tough time. I’ve been through loved one’s deaths before, but none of the deaths had prepared me for Toni’s passing. Her death has left me walking in circles, a lost hiker looking for the trail, an adult looking for reason.

My friend and physician Bob reminded me that Toni had many cards stacked against her due to the severity of her COVID-19 pneumonia.  It is miraculous, unbelievable really, that she lived for 5 months post COVID-19 infection. It was my privilege to be with Toni from January 12-March 25. She taught me so much about life.

As my friend Susan said, the big take away is that when a person is given love and is treated with dignity and respect, no matter what the person’s conditions are, they will thrive. Yes, treat people, all people, with respect and they will flourish! They will shine.  Even if for a brief period of time! Toni had lost a lot of muscle mass and weight mass, was very weak and fragile from COVID-19 so she could not fight the pneumonia she developed in Hobart, Indiana at St. Mary’s Hospital. Once she contracted a pneumonia, her death was swift.

One foot slowly placed in front of the other, we bravely step forward..

POP UP YOGA IN THE PARK, dedicated to Toni’s lovely lively innocent spirit.  Those of you in the Seattle area: Let’s celebrate Toni by doing yoga together under the big sky and in the fresh air at beautiful Green Lake Park! Let’s heal together. Toni is ONE of over half a million Americans who died of COVID-19. Toni represents one of over three million COVID-19 worldwide deaths.  It is dizzying to think of the world’s grieving families and friends of those lost.  Hurricane-proportions of collective grief and emotional pain from this pandemic are swirling around this world. Times call for healing.

WHERE: GREEN LAKE, SEATTLE  

Friday, April 16 10-11am (What a great session this was and I feel better already.)

Saturday, April 17  10-11am

Sunday, April 18 10-11am

Outdoor yoga will take place at my new Yoga in the Park location which is at Green Lake Park, on the grass between the Seattle Public Theater (Bathhouse Theater) and West Green Lake Drive, N.
7312 W Green Lake Drive N typed into maps will get you there. Parking lot nearby.
Bring your yoga mat.

Please wear your mask. You can remove it once you are settled on your mat. Many people are vaccinated, but not everyone is.  And YES, my Yoga in the Park classes will be held at this location this summer every Tuesday  6-7pm in June, July, and August.  In addition, weather permitting, I will set up additional pop up classes at this location! Shade and sun available.

VIEW RECORDING OF EULOGY FOR TONI
https://vimeo.com/537031333

Eulogy for Toni

Our hearts are heavy with Toni’s passing. We sink into an abyss because saying goodbye to someone so pure of heart and so innocent is heartbreaking.

I keep thinking how Toni deserved better in this life. She survived a childhood fever, which resulted in living with brain trauma.  Imagine how hard it is to navigate a world in which reading, writing, concepts of time and mathematics, directions, and basic mechanics of turning a machine on and off are simply off limits to you. Toni worked hard every day to make sense of this world.

Later, Toni survived the worst type of breast cancer.

She survived all this, with a certain grace and fortitude.

And then COVID-19 hit. She was hospitalized and put on a ventilator. For five months, Toni fought fiercely for her life. She worked so hard in Chicago to get off the ventilator. I was with her every day. She made progress. She became vent-free.

I honestly thought she was going to make it.  But then she got a pneumonia. Her death was swift. She had no fear. She was a woman of great faith.

We had an angel in our midst. Did you know that?

Here are nephew John Urbano’s words, “Toni never asked for anything. She only gave. Her time, her smile, her love, her light. Always doing. Always close. Always happy. Always proud of her life and her family.  As I continue my own life, I’m reminded today to be just a little more like Toni! See what Toni sees. And give more than I receive. What a gift and a teacher Toni was to us all.” (Thank you, John)

I will forever be changed by Toni’s love, her strength, her innocence, her vibrant art, her light.  To be with Toni these past months was a privilege.

Toni was pure joy, and though she had many hardships, she also had a beautiful life. She continued to enjoy her life fully after our parents died.  A whole new world opened up to her. She fully blossomed and learned and grew so much. She became more independent, more social, developed many friendships, and discovered so many things she loved to do like making ceramics, doing art, practicing yoga, singing, and dancing. For Toni, life was about loving people and having fun (and getting into good trouble with Maria)!

Toni loved everyone. She never judged people by the color of their skin, social status, whether rich or poor, perfect bodies or imperfect.  For Toni every person was a person to cherish.  All of us here have been blessed by Toni.

We were blessed by her love and her fun spirit.

For a moment, I’d like you to close your eyes and in your mind’s eye, I’d like you to see:

Yellow Sunrises and Purple Sunsets

Red Tree Trunks with Orange and Purple Leaves

A Full Moon over Choppy Waters

Purple and Red Volcanoes Swirling with Anger and Frustration

Hearts made from hundreds of pieces of shredded paper

Food and Origami Collages

Firework-Flowers and Flowers Printed from Paint-Covered Forks, forks “borrowed” from hospital food trays

Landscapes with Red Setting Suns

Mandalas in Blue, Purple, and Red Designs

Green Four-Leaf Clovers for The Luck of the Irish

Red Roofed Houses and Towering Trees with Full Moon

Big smiles. Toni smiles. Toni hugs. Toni compliments.

Picture the name T-O-N-I carefully printed out

See the word L-O-V-E carefully printed out

Then see the two words put together!

T-O-N-I   L-O-V-E

And you have entered Toni’s world, where family is your most precious asset, where everyone is kind and good, where life is rich and colorful, where a completed work of art is given away even before the paint is dry, where you dance and sing away your pain, where the present moment is all you’ve got.

Open your eyes!

On the Sicilian island of Pantelleria

I visited ancient 3^rd Century B.C. tombs carved out from the existing rock

up on a mountain top

wind whipping up my hair

Our guide Tonino pointed out a carved-out cup-like dip in the tomb

A cup called a lagrimatoia.  The deceased person’s head, tilted at an angle, was placed right next to this carved depression in the stone.

The ancients believed all the unshed tears and pain and hardships of the deceased person’s life would flow into the lagrimatoia.

A tear collector carved into the tombstone from the 3^rd Century BC!

I imagine my lagrimatoia should be huge, cavernous!

Perhaps it can never be not be large enough to capture this flow of sadness.

Toni, I held your hand in the hospital in Chicago and in the ambulance while transferring to Indiana.

I am still holding your hand.

I will never let go.