His phone still sits on his air fryer in my kitchen. It is covered with dust. There is a place not far from me where you can get money for old phones that are no longer being used, but I won't take it there. It one of many things that I keep close to me...because it was his.
"Born into eternal life" - that is what they started writing on memorial cards instead of "died". I deeply appreciate that. It was three years ago today that my brother, Robert Jos Myers, Jr., was born into eternal life. For three years I have carried regrets about the fact that I missed what turned out to be my last opportunity to see him, and that I wasn't there when it happened. However, my faith tells me that he was not alone.
It is hard for us to look past the pain, the illness and the losses that our loved ones suffered in their final months, weeks and days. Jos had congestive heart failure and colon cancer. He had to wear a catheter and adult diapers. On the last day of his life, this man who once climbed the Colorado Mountains was too weak to walk across the room. Through all of that, Jos was somehow able to live with a spirit of joy. He said that he had done everything he set out to do in life, and that he was ready to go. We often think about our loves ones' final suffering without ever considering how good it must have felt for them to be freed from it.
The darkest hour is just before dawn. Jos knew that. In our mother's final months, she was tired of being sick, and told us that she was ready to go. She actually asked Jos to pray that she would die. He said he wasn't able to do that until the very end. However, when he viewed her body after she passed, there was a small part of him that was celebrating. "You go, girl" he told her. Remembering what Jos said to Mom, I wrote "You go, bro!" on the cake at his memorial service. He hadn't told me that story until a few days before he himself passed. At that time he looked at me and made the following promise, "If I can, I will send you a sign."
When looking for a sign from Jos, I had completely forgotten about some things that happened previously. Aunt Claire said she felt that she was getting a sign from her deceased daughter Annette, when a light in her house kept going on by itself. I thought of that on the night after the funeral of my step-father, Pat. I woke up in the middle of the night that night and saw that a light in my bedroom had somehow gone on by itself. Two days after Jos died, I noticed that the lights were on in his place. That was really surprising because Jeanie was just telling me how dark it looked over there the night before. Less than a month later, I was talking to my brother's spirit. Later that day I went into the room that had been my bedroom when Pat passed. The very same light that had gone on by itself when Pat died was on again, only this time it was really amazing because that light had not been working for years!
Jos left us with music, artwork, stories and pictures of himself sitting with us, having supper at the picnic table outside. More will be written about his contribution on his birthday in the fall. Faith is the light that transforms our dark memories. Through it I can be sure that he knows that we haven't forgotten him and that we will someday see him again.
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