Feast days are assigned to saints on the day that they died. While on the official Catholic Church calendar, today is the feast day of Lawrence, Deacon and martyr (he gave new meaning to the word barbecue), I celebrate instead today the feast day of my sister, Mary Ruth.
Mary Ruth was 42 years old when she died of Crohn’s disease on this day in 1997. Ruthie and I our daughters, Meg and Beth, my mom and my dad, and Mary’s great friend, Dr Bob Conlin were present when she died very early in the morning at St Joseph’s Hospital in St Paul, MN. She suffered for many years from Crohn’s, probably had 20+ surgeries over the 20-25 years she had the illness. She almost died any number of times from it. Yet, she continued to travel, continued to work as an OT, until her illness forced her to retire, and was working on a doctorate at the time of her death. She had drive. She had moxie, and she inherited the tenaciousness and stubborness from her Polish ancestry (in my opinion). She knew more about Crohn’s than her internist.
Dad was devoted to her care, preparing her bag of nutrients every day for hyperalimentation (the only way she could receive nutrients intravenously). After her death, he felt great loss … not only because he lost his daughter, but from the moment of his retirement, his life was focused on caring for her (Mary and Dad had a great bond of love for one another).
In 2005, about a year after Dad died, Mom related a dream she had about Mary that eased her mind greatly. She said that in the dream, she found herself at the door of a house. A very beautiful woman opened the door and welcomed her and invited her into the house. My Mom asked if she could see Mary, and the beautiful woman told her she could, but to wait where she was. When the woman returned she led mom to a room that had a window upon which my Mom could see Mary. Mom said Mary looked so healthy, so happy as she played with little children on the floor of the room. Mom said there was a young bearded man standing in the room, smiling as he observed Mary. The beautiful woman led mom back to room she had been, when Mary came, hugged my Mom, and said, “Don’t worry, Mom. I am so happy!” Mom told me that then the dream ended, and she felt completely at peace. She said that the dream was so real that all her senses were engaged. She concluded by saying, “I think that the beautiful woman was the Blessed Mother, and the young bearded man was Jesus.” I affirmed Mom’s experience.
A dying nun, who had befriended Mary during her illness, once expressed to my sister, several years, earlier, “Mary, when my body dies, the cancer also dies. But, I will continue to live.” How true! When our bodies die, we do NOT die, but continue to live more fully than ever before. As a near-death survivor once expressed to me, “Our bodies are like space suits in which we are able to interact and live in this world. Like space suits, and all things, they wear out. However, we do not die but move on to a whole new existence.”
Mary Ruth has never left me, nor has my Mom or my Dad, my brother, Bill, Ruthie’s mom, Rose, her Uncle Harold and Aunt Ev, and so many others whom I have loved. They are here with me, all the time. This is was marvelously attributed to by my own sister two days before she died. Mom and I were with her in hospice when Mary suddenly began to greet many of our dead relatives in the room. She turned to mom and I and said, “They are playing my song. I’m not ready to hear it.” She was right. She still had two more days before she joined in the song.
SONGS FOR MARY
Over the years, I composed three songs for my sister, Mary Ruth. The first two were gifts to Mary Ruth on her birthday.
Song One
This song was composed for Mary in the mid to late 70’s. I had just begun to compose in earnest, and was still exploring my skills as a composer.
This second song was composed as a birthday present for Mary Ruth in the early 90’s. I taped a rudimentary recording of it for her, and gave her the original music I scribbled on music manuscript paper. I made a photocopy and put it in a file. In 2016, I had wanted to publish it and could only find the first page and the final page. I still had a copy of the cassette tape. So I played it over and over again, and painstakingly recreated all the music on paper to get the complete song. I then, re-recorded it for the album.
The third and final song was composed as a memorial to my sister, Mary Ruth, following her death. It had begun as a setting of a Psalm used on Good Friday, “Into your hands I commend my spirit.” I had dedicated the original choral anthem to my sister. In 2018, I decided to recompose it as a piano song in her memory around this time of the year.
God bless you Mary! Happy feast day!
