Aunt Harriet, My Mentor and Friend

by jphilo | Dec 16, 2013 | Family

Sealed with salt water.

The words leaped off the page yesterday as I finished Mockingjay, the third book of the Hunger Games trilogy. The phrase was used by the story’s protagonist, Katniss Everdeen, to describe the process of recording her memories of loved ones she’d lost in the years recounted in the trilogy. The words Katinss wrote about her departed friends and family were, as she said, sealed in salt water.

As are my words and thoughts today.

Word came this weekend of the passing of my husband’s aunt, Harriet Walker. The news was expected, even anticipated, since she fell and broke her hip this past summer. She was ready to leave this world, to meet the Lord she served face to face, to be reunited with the great cloud of witnesses who went before her, and to join her beloved husband Harold,  who died little more than a year ago.

Still, my words are sealed with salt water.

Because Aunt Harriet was my mentor and friend for more than ten years. We were not related by blood, but by a shared love of writing that bound us close together. When her book Your Alaskan Daughter came out, the members of my book club read and loved it. She ordered numerous copies of my first book, A Different Dream for My Child, and handed it out to families of children with special needs. When her health began to fail and sustained writing became difficult for her, she remained my steadfast cheerleader. Each summer at Family Camp, her eyes shone when we talked about writing. We laughed and talked and dreamed about the stories in our head begging to be written.

Finally, she asked if I would write a book with her.

So together we wrote Unraveling, the story of her mother-in-law, Mary Anne Tombaugh, who lived with Harold and Harriet for several years as Alzheimer’s unraveled her memories and thoughts. Harold and Harriet received and read the manuscript of the lovely, sweet story that emerged from our joint effort just a few months before Harold died. The email Harriet sent after she read it will ever be a source of great joy for me. Just as the passing of a woman who shared my love of words and story will ever be a source of sorrow.

A passing sealed with salt water.

Until, one day, we meet again in heaven. Where we will put our heads together and write stories and stories and stories in praise of the God who wove our lives together through our mutual love of words and of the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ.