Hello Friends,

     Some of you heard me reflecting on Sunday about some of the blessings and challenges of cleaning out my parents’ home.   The questions of what to keep, what to give away, and hardest of all, what to discard, posed some daunting choices for me last week.
      I’m grateful for all the ways I was buoyed, encouraged, nudged and guided, in what turned out to be an exhausting, tender, but not traumatic time.
      The greatest blessing of all came in the form of Maxine, my folks’ friend and longtime housekeeper.   Beautiful, strong, formidable of energy and will, Maxine came right over as soon as we hit the ground there, and insisted on being there to help us through the whole time.
     There was no part of the house she didn’t know, no nook, cranny, closet, or corner into which she wouldn’t dive, or get me to dive, so we could do what needed to be done.
    When some sentiment-laden thing would emerge, she would allow me a few moments of “feeling,” then she would ask:
     “Okay, now, Baby, what you gonna do with it?”
      Sometimes I’d say “I don’t know, Maxine.  What do you think?”
      Sometimes she’d offer an opinion, but mostly she’d say “That’s for you to decide, Sugar.”   Then she’d wait a heartbeat and ask again:  “What do you want to do?”
      In other words, we don’t have all day to sit around and feel about every one of these pictures, mementos, books, dishes, odds and ends—we have work to do.  And the work involves deciding what will actually be of some value, even if only sentimental, to me and mine—or, if given away, might actually be of more use to someone else.
     Sometimes she’d say, “Oh, go on and keep it then (if you can’t make up your mind), and you can decide later.”
Then she would add, “You’re gonna get back and one day be opening up all these boxes and saying to yourself, ‘Lord, have mercy, what did I keep all this old stuff for’?”

     So Maxine helped me move forward, and get the job done—not perfectly, not even completely, but as well as possible, under the constraints of time and energy.
     That’s one part of the blessing of Maxine.   The other part was the love that informed everything she said and did.   She loved my mother—they were a lot alike, and they were friends.  She knew how much my mother loved me and mine, how much my parents loved each other.   From time to time she would say so.  And from time to time she would ask, “You alright, Sarah?  How you doin’?”
      “Yes, Maxine, I’m alright,” I could honestly say—and I was.
      Having her benignly bossy self around to spur me forward was almost like having my mother back for a little while.   Likewise, having somebody care how I was, ask me if I was alright, and understand the weight of this stage of our grieving and moving on—there’s no sweeter gift one human being can give another.
     I thank God, today, for Maxine, and for all the Maxines of the world, who keep us on target, and connected to love.
    I look forward to moving forward, and finding love with you this Sunday, and all our days to come.

Shalom,