It’s here.. the official anniversary of Sam’s passing.. and honestly.. it’s been a good day. It’s so hard to know what to expect on days like this.. but it seems that it wasas I had anticipated, a lot like most days .. a mix of deep sadness at not having Sam in our physical lives and sparks of fun and joy sprinkled in brought by our kids, family and friends. The thing that give a day like this so much weught is the large number of other peopl ewho mark it with you.. that made it generally a better and easier day than most.
Last night was really the harder time for me. THat marked the actual anniversary of Sam’s accident.. which is really when he stopped existing in his physical form. I spent a good deal of yesterday thinking aboutthat first, so very difficult and ad evening. I busied myself yesterday with finishing the decorations on the Sam sculpture out front (note the new guitar) .. and some welding for the friends of Sam art show. The day passed very qucikly
Towards evening I was really freaking out. I broke a glass while cleaning up… I was kind of wreck. Diane and I were having an intesne conversation about Sam when suddenly she yelled.. ‘there’s a mouse behind you in the stove !’.. This brazen guy had actually climbed up through the burners of our stove and was trying to get at our foccacia !.. You have to squint a bit to see him in this highly maginified and grainy pict.. but there he is.. Somehow seeing this guy turned my evening around.. and I was fine.. About that time a bounc of the kids friends started showing up and the evenin took on a more celibratory tone..
I didn’t have a whole lot of need for ritual last night.. I realized that I’d been doing so much observing of Sam’s passing every day.. that I didn’t feel the need for too much special stuff (eg. prayers, etc).. I did do one religious-ish thing which is to light a yarhtzeit (????????) candle for Sam.. In judiasm you’re supposed ot burn one of these for 24 hours on the anniversary of a loved one’s passing .. It did. indede burn for 24 hours…
We fell asleep peacfully last night and were in a sound sleep unitl about 2:15 when all the smoke alarms in the house decided to go off.. We lay there slepily trying to figure out the cause of all the noise. I dragged myself downstairs to see what was up.. the kids were cooking some mozzerella sticks.. but they had just gone into the oven.. and the wood stove was closed up.. never did figure out what was causeing the alarms.. but we oppened the doors and turned on teh exhaust fans and the alarms quit.. The only think I can figure out is either.. a) something had dripped into the oven and was causign invisible smole.. or b) Sm was saying hello to us.. I’m going with b) .
I woke up and Diane showed me the page from yesterday’s calendar… hmmm..
We puttered around for a few hours this mornign getting ready for the folks coming over tonight. Mason and Scott helped us out by runnign in to town to pick up soem new mig welding gas for me and bagels for all of us.. As soon as they got back we all sutied up and headed up to Bolotn to climb the fire tower.. It was pouring rain and freezing.. a great day for a walk up a mountain..
There were about 15 of us in total.. (plus Chai).. we plunged up the mountian.. the snow got pretty deep in places.. it was mid thigh at the top.. no fun to drop through..
Here we are mid way..
Finally at the hut at the top.. the rain had let up quite a bit. Everythign was coated with ice..
We went inside and had a chai tea toast to Sam..
It ws too nasty out for everyone to climb the fire tower. Max, gabe and I decided to do it in memory of the time we did it o spread soem of Sam’s ashes..The three of us tromped up the hill to the tower.
The rickity ladders were completly covered with ice.. it was nasty climbing
The three of us finally got to the top.. it was like a skating rink up there.. and the wind was blowing like crazy. It was FREEZING !.. The wind makde it tought toe light the small fireworks we’d braught with us.
As soon as they’d gone off we slid back down the ladders back down to solid earth… I was glad to be down !
We went back to the lode where the other were and did a biggish block of fireworks..
Then we headed down the hill on snowboards, skiis, snow skates , sleds, bottoms and feet.. It was steep goign down.. some good sleeding !
We had one wet and tired doggy at the end of the hike !
It was raining pretty hard again at the bottom of the hill.. I just needed to get home and get soem warm and dry clothes.
We got home areound 3:30..and took a bath. about 4:30 folks started showing up.. by abotu 5.. Sam’s room was completly packed with his friends.. and it remained packed all night..
I don’t know how many folks came tonight but it was somewhere between 100 and 150 came by to be with us and be with Sam.. it could not have been any nicer.. lots of memories of Sam.. lots of hugs.. some tears.. lots of good food and of coaurse, lots of fire. We’d asked our firends to bring stuff to burn in the fire.. For example. our friend Liz made this cool star to burn..
I handed out printed copise of the SamStone stories people have been writing in. comments from Sam’s mysspace, excerpts from this blog and asked people to make things out of the paper.. Folks made balls, planes, crowns, everything.. It actually stopped raining enough for us to go outside.. so we took the papers and chucked them all in the fire.. it felt good to do it !
At 7 we all gathered aroudn the fire and passed around candles.. We’d asked all our firends around the world to do this at 7PM EST insolidarity with u in memory of Sam. It was beautiful seeing all those candles going.
We also sent up a hot air baloon .. It wsa a bit blusterry for launch.. but we got it flying (truth be told.. these ballons pictures are from last night.. but we did anther one tongiht.. just no pictures)
… and we ended.. of course, with fireworks.. good ones this time. Dam would have loved it.. I hope he did !
We did do a little homemade firemagic.. here we are tossing Cremora non-dairy creamer on the fire.. It’s dangerous stuff. Max singed his hand quite painfully in this process.
The one ritual I had saved for today was to get rid of the ratty concert bracelets I’ve been wearing on my right wrist.(Not the sam memorial bracellt on my left wrist) Since Sam died, ‘ve not taken off any concert braceletss off my wrist.. I think I had about 9 of them.. I cut them off and tossed them in the fire..
At that point we all moved back inside and finished up 2 bags of clay making SamStones, eating the remaining soup and ice cream.. and just generally hanging out.
It was a wonderful and special evening for us. I want to thanks all of our friends in the commmunity wh have been there for us these last few days.. and this last whole difficult year. You’re all like family to us now. I also want to thank all the folks who called, mailed or emailed us to fish us strength over the past few days.. You good wishes have really helped us… Adnd I want to thank our extenede families .. they’ve been supporting us as they do their own mourning for Sam…
What a day.. well.. it’s time to go to slepp. We’re all doing the Jarred Williams run tomorrow at 8:30.. should be fun..
Fianlly.. Sam.. We all love you so very much.. your friends love you.. if you ever needed proof.. tonight was it..
Gnite”
-me