In the grieving process of losing my son Alex to an accidental drug overdose, I have started writing a blog as therapy. Not only has it helped me, but from comments received, it let's others know they are not alone and what they feel is sometimes exactly what they are SUPPOSE to feel. Bless you all who find yourselves in my position; I wish you weren't.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

I promised myself when the first snowfall happened this year I would share a story about Alex. It's been awhile since I wrote, but not a day I haven't thought about him. And with snow comes snowman and fun.

EVERYONE in the family thinks that I love snow. I do, but I didn't ALWAYS. It was when the kids were much younger that I LEARNED to love it. When the boys would go to bed, and when they woke up, the first thing they did was look out the window to see if there was snow. If it was snowing at night, it was everything to get them to go to bed. It wasn't until I let them catch snowflakes on their tongues that they would. If it snowed during the night, both of them would race to get dressed up in their snow gear to be the first to put footprints in the backyard. Many arguments ensued because Adam would kind of win ALOT. So I settled it by giving one the backyard and one the front yard. And they would trade the next time. Alex liked the front yard because back then we had a pine tree in the front lawn. He would search to see if any birds had nests in it, or even run up on it and watch the squirrels run from it. We decorated the tree with plastic bulbs and lights and bright red garland. And if the snow was just right, we HAD to make a snowman. One morning, Mark woke up to see that some kids had knocked down the snowman. Knowing how disappointed the boys would be, he put it all together before he went to work so it would be there when they woke up. Sure enough, Alex was the first to get up and look out the front window to see if it had snowed anymore and to see how "Frosty" was doing. The imagination of children!!  They could play for hours and even though there lips were blue, they would still cry when I dragged them in from the cold. But hot chocolate with exactly 6 miniature marshmallows always was waiting for them. (no Swiss Miss back then, it was milk warmed up with Hershey's syrup)  

I can tell you the last time a snowman has been on out front lawn. Alex saw the little girl next door trying to build one, so he showed her how it was done. He even had to come in and borrow a hat, scarf and mittens because she didn't have extra to finish her guy. Alex came in with a little grin on his face. She would always say HELLO ALEX and he would smile back and say HELLO SARAH and then she would run away. We always thought she had a little crush on him. He just laughed because she ran EVERY TIME; it was so cute.

So the next time you see a snowman, don't automatically think some little kid made it. Because I know personally a big kid who loved to play in the snow.

2 comments:

  1. I too lost a young daughter 4 yes ago and we lived in Oklahoma when we came back after are first time sledding you could not keep her inside happy to here your story David

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  2. Thank you David. They may not be PRESENT in our lives to see and touch everyday, but they are never far from our hearts or thoughts.

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