Greeting the dawn.............13th May 2012

 Sometimes Matthew, I waken very early in the morning, especially when the daylight hours are growing longer. The dawn chorus of the birds is reaching it's crescendo, reminding me of the day you were born that glorious late April 1976. I laid in my hospital bed as the day unfolded and there was a blackbird singing just outside the window. The beginning of a long, hot summer. I felt incredibly happy. Newborn son asleep.      

 But it's your dad I want to talk about today. He recently had an 11 week course to become a fully bona fide cricketing umpire.He went off yesterday to his first match, being his début and being supervised he, and I, (who would have been stressed let's face it!) decided he was better to go alone. Once he has found his feet I will be accompanying him.
As he donned his gear, I felt the old familiar tears well up. You would have been so proud of him. And no doubt would have gone to one or two of his matches. I thought about his own dad, whom you and your brother called  Grandad John, and his mum Granny Sellers, both cricketing afficianados. Indeed they took your dad to his first match when he was still a babe in arms, pushing his pram to the local ground! How pleased they would've been too.

Matt in the garden. 2002 

 So, once again, my memories were stirred and images of you so clear in my mind that I so wanted to be able to talk to you and share all the news. Inevitably, I woke early thinking of you and it was such a beautiful daybreak. I wandered up the garden at 4.15am, and took the photos. I always feel that God knew exactly what He was doing when he created that very first special garden. I find the reality of ours so comforting, and therapeutic. What a creation we have in all it's joyfulness!
I forever miss you, to a depth so profound I cannot see the end, and the enormity of the loss so vaste and wide, that it surrounds me. But we have the promise that creation will be redeemed, and oh what a day that will be! And what a hope we have in our own redemption! So in the midst of deep deep pain and loss, there can be joy.          
So
"You are the Lord
The Saviour of all
God of creation we praise you,
We sing the songs that awaken the dawn,
God of creation we praise you!"

Definately out!!

 Love you Matt, always.
So "Until the day breaks and the shadows flee away," may Jesus hold you close.

Dawn in the garden.