Let's Go Wild

A miracle

Allow me to share my experience with grace and synchronicity. My daughter, at the age of two years and two weeks, said “Take my photo” and patiently waited for me to get out my phone. Then she posed for this, and I only took one…

As a dear friend commented, “I see no baby in those eyes….”

Now some background. In 1980, my son died when our house caught fire. We only salvaged a few photos from the ashes, and one was the last photo we had taken of him. In that photo his smile could not have been more joyous, his eyes too, sparkle with an inner light. His death drove me to become a firefighter; which I hoped would allow me to save another family from the heart-shattering experience of losing their child. In my city, we lost a father and three children just an hour into Christmas Day one year. Seeing Mother standing on the sidewalk, holding her only surviving child, was a clear message this path was not for me. There had to be other ways to heal.

When I opened this photo on my phone a bit later, my first thought was of the last photo we had taken of my son. It felt the same, only more. The intentionality of Emily’s request was stunning, especially for one so young. And those eyes….oh my. This thought was quickly discarded: I hope this is not the last photo of take of her. Now for the grace and synchronicity…

Three days later, 13 January, is the date my son died in 1980. So on this anniversary, my heart was heavy. Just after two in the afternoon, my wife burst into the room where I was working and yelled, “Help me”. I saw that Emily was choking. Mother held her trying to do a Heimlich with one hand. My first thought was oh please Goddess, not again, not today. I raised Emily’s butt so she was upside down and the third slap on her back dislodged the candy (her sister had left out inadvertently) and she began to gasp for air.

The synchronicity of the date is beyond belief. But as I process the trauma re-experienced, words cannot express how grateful I am that this time, I was able to save my child. I grasp that we all die, some earlier than others. I grasp that sometimes grace first appears as tragedy, before being transformed into a miracle. I had my own near-death experience at age 18; and I grasp that I stayed in this body for a purpose. Maybe this moment was that purpose. Maybe my old soul daughter also has a purpose. May it be a mighty one.