Dear Bethany,
I can’t sleep, I can’t eat, I’m sick... so sick since you’re gone. If I only could tell you how much I love you, how sorry I am. I’m sorry you were taken so soon in a way like this. I’m sorry we won’t see each other get married or have babies. Nineteen years is too short, but you enjoyed life and inspired everyone who knew you to love as you loved, to laugh as you laughed (except maybe for the whole snort and lean to the left till you fell our of your chair thing). Your life should not be remembered by one fateful night, but by a fountain of joyful memories.
I walked the labyrinth at the funeral home today; I remember how you loved that movie with that freak, David Bowie. I kept thinking you were walking it right up ahead of me and that it was like we were kids at Daytona Beach again, burying are feet in the cool wet sand. Life right now also reminds me of a Disney monorail, it’s going by in a fast blur and it seems like my only guide is speaking in a different language. I remember you and Shane daring me to do the crab walk over a sewer grate when I was 3. When I fell in and got stuck, I remember you told me the alligators in the sewer would eat me before dad could pull me out. I remember feeding you tomato soup when you were 11 and had just gotten 4 teeth pulled. I remember you said that God told you that me and Jonathan were going to get married some day.
I wish you could see all the people who love you and how much care they’ve shown to our family. It might not always have been clear or felt, but you are treasured by so many. You will never be forgotten. When I walk down the isle on my wedding day, I’ll know you’re there in the front in spirit holding flowers, watching me too. If I have a girl I promise I’ll name her Bethany. When I go into overseas missions, I’ll remember how you always supported me and told me how proud you were.I hope I can live up to being the oldest child and the best sister to Clinton now. Mom and dad are so sad right now. God will help them. I’ve found that God is a lot bigger than I thought He was. He’s more merciful, too. I keep trying to think of what you would say to people right now if you could. That’s why I love looking at pictures of you. Your vivacious presence is captured in every single one of them. It’s like you’ve always been trying to tell people to enjoy what they have. So I’d like to close with the end of a favorite poem of mine by William Cullen Bryant, entitled Thanatopsis...
“So live, that when thy summons comes to join the innumerable caravan which moves to that mysterious realm, where each shall take his chamber in the silent halls of death... thou go not like the quarry slave at night, scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and smoothed by an unfaltering trust. Approach thy grave like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him and lies down to pleasant dreams.”
I miss you Bethany. Nothing will ever be the same without you here. May God grant us all grace, and to you, peace to rest in His arms which have eternally longed for your return to Him.
