“HeartSpun Talk from the Crucible of Experience”©

From the life of Ken Matthies - Author, Poet, Real Life Storyteller

‘A Mother’s Gratitude’ tells you a brief story of the grieving process from a mother’s perspective – and serves as an example of acceptance and hope for all of you readers looking for the affirmation that there are others out there like you who are also grieving the pain of separation from their child.

If you’ve read my book ‘How to Survive the Death of a Child - A Father’s Book of Healing Light’ you’ll already have become familiar with my daughter Leila, a helicopter pilot lost in a crash in 2002. It was her mother Marie’s encouragement which resulted in the writing and publishing of that book which I wrote telling about my daughter’s life and loss – and my healing from it.

This is an excerpt taken from that book.

“Marie had been totally serious when she encouraged me to write a book about Leila and me. And she’s backed up this encouragement with a package she’s sent on ahead via Greyhound to one of my anticipated locations.

It thoughtfully contains a copy of the newspaper with Leila’s second-year memorial she’s placed in it for this year. This two-year memorial, in the form of a short letter to her daughter from a mother whose heart has been shattered way harder than mine, deserves to be written here.

Because it tells you in the reading of it Who it is that carried her through those times on an empty beach when there’s only one set of footprints; when you’re crying out asking, “Where are you God? How come there’s only one set of footprints here? I thought we were walking together!”

And the answer you get back in your broken heart is His voice saying, “There’s only set of footprints my child, because that’s when I was carrying you.”

Here’s what it has to say…

Leila
Helicopter Pilot
Aug 9, 1975 – Aug 8, 2002

Dearest Daughter,

I miss you so much the pain is unbearable. I wish that I could’ve been a better mother; I wish that I could’ve given you more of my time. I raised you blindly and tried my best. You grew up fast and matured too young. With your strong determination and tenacity, you set your goals high in life and succeeded in your dreams. Through all that – you found room for me and forgave me. You showed me your strength and unconditional love for me, a mother who never knew a mother’s love. You not only became my pride and joy but we found love and respect for each other. Most of all, we became friends. I am profoundly honored to have had you in my life. I was truly blessed. I cannot be angry at God for taking you away; rather, I am in awe of the miracle of love and wisdom through you He gave to me.

Fly High With His Heavenly Love Beneath Your Wings
Love Forever – Mom

This letter says it all, and though the pain of its truth still spikes your heart there’s this message of gratitude to the One who carried her then and still carries her today inch by inch – or better yet – step by step just like the rest of us grievers.”

Author's Bio: 

For almost forty years of his life Ken Matthies has been a writer and chronicler of life expressed in poetic form, following the family tradition laid down by his grandfather before him.

Faced with the dramatically life altering experience of his helicopter pilot daughter’s sudden death in 2002 he has grown to also become a literary author of true events based on his own life. Though grief opened his literary doors it is the Light of Love and Memories supplying the fuel of inspiration to write through them.

As a second-chance dad given the opportunity to verbally share his life stories with his newly rediscovered daughter it was she who told him that she believed him to be a ‘worthy man’ after having heard them, and who encouraged him that they should be shared in written form beyond her own life – not yet knowing as she said it that she was soon to leave him behind. As a bereaved father and writer learning how to live life again in the Light of his own Love and Memories of his daughter, he writes those stories now as a testament to her belief and faith in their value.

His full length book entitled "How to Survive the Death of a Child - A Father's Story of Healing Light" was the first of these stories which he wrote in the Light of those Love and Memories.

He lives in the solitude and grandeur of a tiny southern Yukon village with his Tlingit native wife Skoehoeteen and the successor to their venerable old Tahltan bear dog Clancy Underfoot, who now happily awaits them at the Rainbow Bridge in Doggy Heaven. She’s a new female puppy named Hlinukts Seew which means ‘Sweet Rain’ in the Tlingit language, a wonderful phonetic variation in memory of Clancy’s name who was also called C.U. for short. It’s a good place to tell those stories from.

You can read more of Ken's writings and find his Amazon Kindle book at www.kenmatthies.com.