Grief
Learning to Reconcile When Hope Dies
By Trinda Jocelyn It was abnormally late when I picked up the phone. My mother’s name was lighting up the screen. I tapped the green dot, put the phone to my ear, and heard her voice say, “Your dad passed away today.” That was five years ago. I don’t remember much of the conversation after that, I do remember the feeling. Sadness and relief at the same time and then guilt for feeling the relief. My father and I were not close. He was not close to any of his daughters. He left shortly after I…
Read MoreOur Adoption Story
By Victoria Utman Four years ago, I learned that a quickening is the feeling an expecting mother has when their child moves beneath their breast- a stretch felt through the very muscle, sinew, and core of the woman as her baby develops inside of her. It’s a beautiful, active word and was brought up in a writing workshop I attended. Around this time, my husband and I had just begun our first serious conversations about beginning a family together and I instantly fell in love with the concept. “Quick” meaning alive or lively; the emotional made physical…
Read MoreA New Way to See
By Arlene Manson It is 9 o’clock on a Monday night. This article- that I am only starting to write now- is due by midnight. In my mind, in my new beginning, I am going to be that person who always gets things done early. In my earthly reality, I am a procrastinator and I get things done, but always at the last minute. When I think of beginnings, I think of starting or trying new things. One new beginning that I had this year was traveling for mission work. This past winter, during February, while Canadians were…
Read MoreNew Beginnings
By Loreen Husband Sunrise or sunset? If you’re looking at a photo it can be quite difficult to decide which one the photo features unless you were there when it was taken. In a recent edition of the Dauphin Church bulletin, Tim Pippus said in his weekly article; “People spend a lot of time thinking about new beginnings. We often obsess about how we feel right now. Yet, we make the best decisions when we think, ‘Regardless of where I am now or what I am going through, how do I want this story to end?’”. I will admit…
Read MoreThe Diagnosis
By Sheena Koops It started with squirrels at the end of his bed, and sometimes he would make Mom get up and see what those tall people in the corner were doing. He saw horses in a field and riders wearing tall hats with stovepipe points; he saw all this through the walls of his own home and through the houses along the streets. Not long before he passed he said, “Why is the little girl crying?” referring to the empty chair at the round kitchen table of their new home in Fort Qu’Appelle. Dad had neuropathy, a…
Read MoreSisterhood
By Lisa Gillies Sisterhood, what a beautiful word: connecting, bonding, sharing, encouraging, and so much more. This past February was my first time at the Sister Triangle Retreat; what an honour it was. We learned or were reminded that we might not be okay, and that is, okay. We are enough. To be a light wherever we go, and we may never know what others may be going through, but we can stand together. I was amazed when listening to others share, yes, I understood, I have been there. And the songs that were chosen, how they ministered to so…
Read MoreMy Uncle’s Passing
By Sheena Koops I remember Christmas, must have been 1987. My Uncle Jelsing and Auntie Sheena, their three boys, and a tag-along-friend-of-the-family came to the farm for Christmas. The young man, like a brother to my cousins, was Michael Koops from Victoria, BC. This young guy, my cousin, and I walked over the prairie into the Souris Valley, sometimes knee deep in snow, pretending we were on a quest. We watched movies; we sang carols, we played games: my cousins and this tall, dark and handsome friend-of-the-family. In August of 1989, I married that guy. Three daughters later, my Uncle and Auntie consider our girls their granddaughters, because they…
Read More