the<\/em>\u00a0death for me.<\/p>\nWe were blessed by the example of generations of intact families and lifetime marriages. We loved our Sunday tradition of \u201c100+ years of continuous worship\u201d (my mother\u2019s fav phrase!) in the same congregation followed by dinner at my parents with my siblings, their spouses and children.<\/p>\n
We were blessed with three sons so wonderfully beautiful, brilliant and kind I\u2019m often amazed that I gave birth to them. My grandmother used to always say \u201cPaula\u2019s boys are so sweet!\u201d\u2026lowered tones \u201cYou know they get that from Charles\u2026\u201d She was so funny and that was so true, I couldn\u2019t get mad. \u00a0And then we were blessed with the perfect daughter-in-love!<\/p>\n
We were blessed to start and sustain PN&A, Inc. an entrepreneurial endeavor successful enough to shelter, clothe and feed us, cover our sons\u2019 college tuition and enduring enough to pass on to the 2nd generation.<\/p>\n
But our biggest blessing (after salvation of course;) was our marriage. CMadison and I practiced mindfulness in our intentionally transcendent marriage layered on our understanding of holistic Christian principles of Oneness\u2026 \u201cthe two shall become one flesh\u201d (Genesis 2:24, Mark 10:8 and Ephesians 5:31). \u00a0It wasn\u2019t a practice we felt led to share, we didn\u2019t proselytize or even really discuss it with other folks, we just built this practice of oneness in the development of our consciously integrated married lives. \u00a0We were each other\u2019s advocate and ally, not just at the end of life and in the face of illness but from the very beginning, in the bloom and seemingly infinite vitality of our youth. CMadison wasn\u2019t a man who made public pronouncements against patriarchy, he was more of a functional than theoretical womanist ally. \u00a0CMadison funded my law school education, proof-read my papers and briefs, attended my moot court competitions like they were sporting events and when our twins were born the summer before my last year in law school, every night they got up, he got up-I nursed, CMadison burped and changed. \u00a0He taught me to cook and after I totalled his\u00a0brand-new, sticker-still-on-the-window<\/em>\u00a0Buick Rivera driving without a license he taught me to drive and bought me my very first car, a sweet, red Austin-Healey, two-seater convertible! CMadison taught forgiveness as a conscious practice, introduced me to organic gardening and was a much better housekeeper (and grammarian) than I.<\/p>\nWe lived together, worshipped together, worked together, homeschooled together and once our sons left for college we traveled together, always just the two of us\u2026.we enriched one another\u2019s lives and preferred one another\u2019s company, we were always working on the transcendance, the oneness.<\/p>\n
So back to my issue with the indefinite and definite article. Articles are adjectives that modify nouns. There are two articles in English, indefinite articles\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0an<\/em>\u00a0which modify non-specifics and the definite article,\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0which modifies the specific. \u00a0CMadison died at home, alone with me, it was beautiful and elegant, just like him. But even in the midst of the sadness and wonder \u2026and yes, I think to death witnessed is much like birth witnessed is a wonder to behold\u2026I realized this death was different for me. I live and worship in the city and congregation where I grew up, my mother grew up and my grandmother grew up. I have experienced a great many deaths\u2026deaths of family members, deaths of friends, deaths of neighbors, deaths of classmates. \u00a0And sadly, I\u2019ve attended far too many services marking\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0death of yet another young person who died tragically and violently. But CMadison\u2019s death was different. \u00a0I think it\u2019s because for me CMadison\u2019s death was\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death, not\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0death.<\/p>\nIn the two years since he died I\u2019ve listened more carefully and noticed more fully how people talk about the deaths they\u2019ve experienced. Increasingly I can tell if the death under discussion was\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0death or\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death. Philosophical musings are more common in the face of\u00a0a<\/em>\u00a0death. The commentary can be quite uplifting and the message warmly comforting. Granted, sometimes folks get a little carried away with the platitudes and bromides that might be best left unsaid at least at the service or grave site: \u00a0He doeth all things well;<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0They\u2019re in a better place;<\/em>\u00a0God doesn\u2019t make any mistakes;<\/em>\u00a0or my favorite\u00a0To be absent from the body is to present with the Lord<\/em>. When I hear that from folks who stay at the doctor\u2019s I kinda\u2019 wonder, why don\u2019t you exercise your absent option the next time you get sick?!<\/p>\nBut back to the point, I don\u2019t think CMadison\u2019s death was\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death for me because we were married. I think the definite or indefinite status of death is derivative of the definite or indefinite status of the lived relationship. That\u2019s why\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death someone experiences could be that of a parent, or a child or a friend- the defining nature of the lived relationship determines the defining nature death.<\/p>\nCMadison\u2019s death was\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0defining death for me because ours was\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0defining relationship for me. \u00a0We were blessed in that way. We each came to the relationship whole and intact. I won\u2019t say we took love for granted, but we weren\u2019t surprised or distrustful of it either. Routinely when I\u2019d say,\u00a0I love you, man!<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0he\u2019d reply,\u00a0You\u2019ve got good sense and excellent taste<\/em>! \u00a0And when he\u2019d tell me,\u00a0You\u2019re amazing Sweetie Pie,<\/em>\u00a0I\u2019d quote my Daddy,\u00a0Tell me something I don\u2019t know<\/em>! Because we were loved, we were able to love and accept love from each other easily, naturally, joyously and with big robust, \u201cchoking on your coffee\u201d laughs. We loved our children dearly from the very first moment we learned of their conception months and months before we ever saw them, but we never forgot that they were derivative of the relationship in which they were created. They never came first. When they were growing up CMadison told them\u00a0She was my woman before she was your mother<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0We made you, we can make more<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0We were happy together before you came, we\u2019re happy together with you here and we\u2019ll be happy together when you leave\u2026because we\u2019re happy together<\/em>. \u00a0 CMadison didn\u2019t spank our sons, call them out of their names when he was angry or even raise his voice to them, but he did not coddle them\u2026 he respected them and their becoming and wanted them to know where they \u201cfit in the big food chain.\u201d<\/p>\nSo today\u2019s the 2nd anniversary of his death. Selfishly I\u2019m sad he\u2019s not here. I say selfishly because I do believe that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord-I\u2019m just not trying to hear anybody telling me that, especially when I suspect they have not yet experienced\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death. \u00a0But even through the sadness, I am full of thanksgiving for having \u00a0been blessed with the kind of love, the kind of joy, the kind of marriage, companionship and respect that could make his death\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0death for me.<\/p>\nPaula Penn-Nabrit is the owner of\u00a0Telos Training, Inc.\u00a0<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"by Paula Penn-Nabrit CMadison loved Strunk & White\u2019s\u00a0The Elements of Style\u00a0and gifted copies to our sons as homeschooling \u201ctreats\u201d. Me, not so much\u2026should that last period have been placed inside or outside of the quotation marks and does anyone really care?! But lately I\u2019ve been musing about indefinite and definite articles, specifically\u00a0a\u00a0death versus\u00a0the\u00a0death. \u00a0It\u2019s been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3202,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[74],"tags":[75],"class_list":["post-3199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eulogy","tag-paula-penn-nabrit"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n