Ephemeral Moments

It's so fleeting.
The tone in Solly's voice that makes me think of Sam.
The words he uses that are Sammy's words.
The giggle or the jump or the turn of phrase...Sam.

He's a constant part of our conversation, but briefly, without dwelling on it.
Sam liked that, we might say.
Sam would have picked that one.
Yes, that was Sammy's shirt or stuffed animal.

Someone told me that I should be telling stories about Sam.
But I am not sure how to translate some of these ephemeral* moments into stories.
The way that Sam was silly.
The way that he would make up stories or play games.
The way that he was impatient when things didn't work fast enough or I focused on someone else when I should be reading to him.
The way that he would sing along with the music of DragonVale.

And the ways that Solly and Yael mirror him.

Solly lined up a whole bunch of random toys yesterday, spending quite a lot of time getting their placement just right so that he could play with them in a grand convention of mixed up toyness (dinosaurs and robots and the like). It held so much of Sam-ness that I had to catch my breath.

I was talking to someone this week who didn't know me. As we were talking, I counted heads of my children, who were off doing their own thing. She said something like, "just the 3, right? or is there a 4th somewhere around here that I don't know about?" Harmless remark, made without any intention to wound.

There's a fourth around here somewhere.
You just can't see him...but we can feel his presence everywhere.

Where we were a year ago: getting chemo & doing yoga, and we had just moved into the Ronald McDonald House.

Where we were two years ago: heading up to camp for Shabbat

June, 2011 - one year before diagnosis

August, 2010

also August, 2010. Check out that classic Sammy face.

July, 2010 at camp

*So I looked up this word, as I often do, since I'm quite worried about using big words that I think I know and finding out that I'm using them quite incorrectly. I'm happy to tell you that I'm using it correctly. But what I really want to tell you is how many times insects appeared as an example to explain what ephemeral means, as in, "short-lived, like some insects." I think Sam would have approved.