For Hollis - who walked in Light
For Hollis – who walked in Light
As you know I’m on a quest. My goal has been to present, in total and online, each child’s loss story I was privileged to hear and then write. Though every interviewed parent has his or her own written copy, my website is for sharing – parents with other parents, parents with their larger family, and parents with others. Though A Patch of Blue is largely about the twenty children I wrote about over these past months, no child’s full story will be in the new book. I am committed to delivering each one in this broader format so that every narrative is available to all who may want to share in some specific grief and grace experiences of each amazing family. The story of Hollis is the seventh in this website series. The storyteller, Elizabeth, is his sensitive, passionate and spiritual mother. In our time together she unfolds for me the details of the loss of her middle child, Hollis Elijah, who died in October of 2011. Below is a small portion of their story.
Elizabeth believes in prayer; she also embraces the idea that life holds inexplicable mysteries: some beautiful and grace-filled, some confusing, some ephemeral, some unfathomable, and some profoundly painful. “I’m open to whatever is going on,” Elizabeth says, her hands expressively opening into the air around her. She shares that she intentionally prayed for the type of children she wanted to bring into the world. In the case of Hollis, “I prayed for a saint...” she says. “There was no grand plan on my part but I have to say in retrospect that Hollis had a profound influence on a lot of people around him and brought his own positive energy and light to the people who knew him.”
“He gave me a song,” Elizabeth declares with assurance. In 2012, the two, mother and son, during a spiritual time together, collaborated on a song she composed called “Walk in Light.” Hope and belief unite in remembrance of a life, not lost, but very much alive in the hearts of those who will always love him. “He makes me laugh still,” Elizabeth affirms. She feels healing every time she senses his presence. “I’m still trying to figure out this whole existence thing we get to share here.” She continues, “I just think we’re supposed to learn how to get through it all with love.”
And it is the love she feels for and from her son that sustains her through her ongoing walk in grief. Elizabeth realizes that her original intention to bear and nurture a saint was a lofty one, but one she believes came true. If we trust that our worldly saints walk compassionately and generously in light while bestowing blessings on others, then Elizabeth can surely call the lifetime and legacy of Hollis Elijah, saintly.
If you want to read this entire story, please go to www.janenicoletauthor.com. Put your cursor on Books at the menu, navigate down and select Parents Tell Their Stories; then find and select that same phrase to get to “For Hollis – who walked in Light.”
In grace and peace, Jane
