Yahweh…

Anne had just learned the word in her Bible study.  

The Name of God in Hebrew was all vowels, and said to be impossible to pronounce, so was given the sound.  

But in fact, the name was the sound of breathing.

The most sacred thing that kept everyone alive, was simply the name of the Creator.

She marveled at how many traditions and cultures focused on the breath, to come back to the self.  To alter the emotion.  Exhalation punctuated so many moments, and when done intentionally, could control the human experience.

Even in meditation, where there was no obvious focus on a higher power, it was proven that breathing affects the body.  Slowed the heart, eased anxiety, and calmed the soul.

Often, she would take deliberate breaths, like she was doing now, to soothe herself.  

Something so simple.  

So easy.  

She felt how it could control her entire body.  Anne marveled at it.  She took it to be proof of something beyond herself.  A glimpse into the spiritual realm.

But that’s how life was, she thought.  The tiniest things were actually miracles. 

Like the breath.

And how some people could breathe life into you.  

Just by being there… 

Her mind went back to Joe.  Tears rimmed her eyes as she recalled him.  In quiet moments like this, she could close her eyes, and feel him there with her.  With her hands clasped in silent prayer, she gently rubbed her own thumbs together, and could almost feel the crinkled roughness of his weathered hand in hers again.

She knew that whatever happened in the future, it was not up to her.  

It was up to Joe, and that breath of his that was hopefully still keeping him alive. 

Her heart pleaded what her lips did not.  But in her mind, she saw him as she wanted him to be.  As she knew him.  

Laughing.  

With that quick wit of his, with which he would answer her every small and detailed inquiry.  Her endless curiosity about him, and his former life.

“Amen,” she whispered, before opening her eyes.  She was sitting on her back deck, and she was sure that her mug of coffee had gone cold.  As she took a sip, she confirmed this, and almost stood to go and microwave it.  But she felt a tickle on her collarbone.  She shivered and instinctively brushed it off, as something fell onto her bare forearm.  The reactive jolt she felt in that instant, had turned to amusement as she saw what it was.

  Not a spider, or a tick, as she had feared.

But harmless.  Adorable.

A ladybug.

How beautiful this little insect was.  No evening gown, no matter how red, or how spotted, could do it justice.  

The intricacies of nature.  More proof of a force at work, beyond her wildest imagination.

Chills went over her, making her get goosebumps and causing the little red insect to stumble as it walked between the blonde and sparse hair.

“Joe?” she whispered, her voice catching in her throat, and a tear falling down her cheek.  

She laughed softly to herself, and shook her head.  

“Ladybug, Ladybug…fly away home,” she heard his raspy song in her mind, as jovially in her head, and as clearly as if he were still there beside her.  

That’s the last thing he had said to her.  The last time she saw him.

Just a coincidence.  This reminder of him, of a moment they had shared.

But she couldn’t shake the feeling.  That maybe he was already gone.  And that he had been there with her, in spirit.  Beside her now, as she was praying.  

That’s just your romantic superstition again, she reprimanded herself.  

That’s just you, trying to cope.  Because you don’t want to lose him.  

But maybe it was his time, she thought.  Maybe this was a blessing.  And she was just being selfish.

If anything, it was God, there beside her, and sending this little creature to remind her that life was bigger than she was.  And that He was still there, even if Joe wasn’t.

And the control of Joe’s breath wasn’t his own, but a higher power was at work. 

“I guess none of us knows when our time is through…Only the good Lawd knows that,” he had told her.  It echoed in her head now.  

Nodding thoughtfully, she looked up toward the clouds, and back down at her arm.

She picked the little red beetle up gently and blew, causing it to lift its wings into flight, off of her finger, and land not too far away.  But only on the wooden railing of the deck.  

I guess it isn’t ready to leave either, she thought, and smiled gently.  She was glad it remained.

Ambivalence filled her.  She hoped to see Joe again, but part of her also hoped he had already left the earthly realm.

Anne imagined him dancing.  Handsome and restored.  Spirited and sociable.  Cheek to cheek with a radiant and beautiful woman.  Dipping her back, both of them lost in the carefree laughter of their youth.

That was possible in Heaven, wasn’t it?

She wanted to believe so.  That anything was possible. 

Her mind went again, back to when she was able to see him for a short while. 

She couldn’t imagine why she had felt so attached to him, when she hadn’t really known him for all that long.  

Maybe it was the fragility of life.  The poignant beauty of it all.  

Meeting a man so old, and knowing her time with him was likely short.

How a chance encounter could turn into an acquaintance so precious.

Just knowing him had changed her.  Ever so subtly, but definitively.  

She was no longer the woman who had first said hello to him, months ago.

It was amazing to her, how simple decisions she made, seemed to change the course of her life.  And it happened to not just her, but everyone.  One small thing could change the direction of everything.  Or introduce people, who might otherwise never have known each other.  Friendships formed.  Jobs developed.  Activities were taken up.  People met and got married…

It was true even in her recent spontaneous steps taken to become a volunteer, without much thought, and on a whim.

Only a year before, she had been struck with the notion that maybe she should do something to serve others.  But then, she had always loved connecting to people.  And it just seemed right.  

And so, she had become a hospice volunteer, which had then led her to Joe, although indirectly.

  But it had brought her to where she had met him.

The assisted living.

Although she was no longer a hospice volunteer.  The woman she had been seeing had been taken off of hospice, and had moved back home with her family.  When one thing ended, another began.  And she hadn’t even planned it.

Spending all of that time at the facility, she began to notice the other people there.  

She found that she was watching some of them disappear, as they passed away without much fanfare.  They were there one day, and the next time she went, a bedroom would be empty.  A nameplate off of the door…and they were just…gone.  

She had always wanted to reach out more to the other people there. 

She was shy, and it was awkward, but that was something she felt she was called to do.

Embrace discomfort.  

To be God’s “hands and feet”.

And connect.  

Listening for that still, small voice that was always speaking to her heart.  And that was directing her steps.

Leaping into the unknown, because that’s all life could promise… 

Anne made her way to the kitchen and reheated her coffee, taking it out before it was ready, and stepping past the cat on the floor, that was stoically and silently begging at her bowl, as usual; and making promises to feed her soon, even though she knew she wasn’t actually hungry.  

Only it wasn’t the cat.  It was her older daughter’s black backpack purse.  And now she would have to make the drive back to school, to get it to her.  Even though she knew she should make her go without it, as a teachable moment.  But hadn’t she made that same mistake too?  When she was a girl.  Losing items that were right in front of her face, and misplacing things she should have been “old enough” to remember herself?  No.  She deserved the grace of her mother, just like she was granted as a teenager.  

She sighed, and willfully ignored the clutter in the periphery, as she went back to the porch.  

It could wait just another moment.  All of it.  

Life was too short, and this didn’t matter, she decided.  

She wanted to be back outside.  To clear her head, and go beyond herself.

Near nature.  

Closer to the evidence of God.

She went to stand over by where the ladybug still rested on the ledge.  Even that little thing had a life story, she thought, gently stroking the hard shell.  It immediately began to waddle forward, and raised its wings to take flight.  

Anne watched it until it was nothing more than a speck, and squinted against the high morning sun.  

“Fly away home,” she whispered.