Toni Lepeska
When a Parent Dies
I knew Mom would die, and I knew I couldn’t prevent it, but the one thing I asked God is that I’d be with her when she took her last breath. But I was not with her. This hurt as much as the fact that she was dead. I felt I had devastatingly failed her. …
I think of the pandemic as the time in between. It is the period after normal has ended but a new normal has yet to be established. It is the time life is still dizzingly out of control. I feel as if I’ve been holding my breath, waiting to resurface from the depths of a …
Does Fall do to you what it does to me? Does it transport you to the past? Or maybe it inspires you to transform, to restyle your life like trees that tint their leaves. I wake, dress, grab my essentials and walk onto the carport. The breeze flutters through my hair. No more gummy sweat …
My heart goes out to those who are losing people during this pandemic, enduring the absence of final goodbyes at hospitals and the rituals of friends at funerals. We need mourning rituals. They help us feel love. They help us cope. They help us manage the array of emotions that rain down on us like …
By Toni Lepeska The coronavirus pandemic has elicited a new catch phrase – “stay safe.” I hear it on the telephone with doctor’s offices and in text messages from friends. It has replaced “take care,” “see you later,” and “be careful.” How essential is safety? Where can we find it when our world has been …
I thought I needed to get around people. What I needed was to be alone. I’m a loner of sorts. A homebody. An introvert. I was raised by a woman who left the house only two or three times a year. When the stay-at-home orders came down amid COVID-19 fears, I thought “I’ve got this.” …
We hear the phrase slip out of the lips of well-meaning friends at funerals – and we hear it now that a pandemic seeds fear and anxiety into our hearts and lives. But what does “God is in control” really mean? First, what it does not mean? It does not mean God sets out to …
The coronavirus is messing with the ways we grieve and mourn. All over the news and all over the country, we’re hearing about social distancing – and funeral services aren’t excluded despite their cultural and emotional importance. In America, funeral directors are staggering events like visitations or wakes to minimize the number of people in …
