71717

71717 :   a NUMBER PALINDROME to celebrate...

April 1987 for Jeremy's 10th birthday

For King George the First three hundred years ago in 1717, the celebration was a water trip down the Thames River accompanied by George Freidrich Handel's brand new composition "Water Music" and highlighted with spectacular fireworks.

For me it was the quiet contemplation of the day our lives in the Nichols Family were forever changed 30 years ago in 1987 when Jeremy fell out of that old cottonwood tree and died of a severe closed head injury the following day in St. Anthony Central Hospital.  He had begun his life there 10 years, 3 months, and 16 days earlier.  It was only fitting his life was ended there, as well, but on a different floor from the joyous welcoming of new babies.

Thirty years!  How can that be?  It sometimes still feels like it wasn't that long ago.  And other times it feels like it has been forever as I look back to the progress of our collective life--sad, happy, devastating, buoyant....and everything in between.

No fireworks for me last Monday, but it was still a celebration of sorts.

So, here are my reasons to commemorate 71717 in 2017:

• I have a sure testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the promises of eternal families.
• 
  
• There is personal conviction that Jeremy has been doing missionary work for the Nichols Family on the other side of the veil, for who else should do it but someone in the family.  Blessings for the family both here and there.
• 
  
• There have been thirty years to calm the giant waves from that cataclysmic event.  Now the aftermath is nothing but ripples.  Thirty years to move us away from the pain and grief and bone-deep ache of missing him--at the table, tucking him into bed, in his favorite spot on the couch for Family Home Evening, his place on the bench in Sacrament Meeting, his spot in the car....
• 
  
• Ten years on earth isn't a long time, but there are still sweet, sweet memories of a cute, freckle-faced blond haired boy who at age ten was the spitting image of his dad at age ten.
• 
  
• There is a box down the basement with a few items that marked some of the milestones of his short life.  I like to look through it now and then and remember again the events that brought about those treasures.
• 
  
• The elephants throughout my house weren't his, but they are my ongoing acknowledgement of something Jeremy liked.  And I remember again the "Elephant Safari" birthday party we had for him when he turned eight while we were living in Berlin.  Something special because he wasn't going to be baptized in the Arvada Stake Center like the rest of the kids were.
• 
  
• When the weather is too hot or too cold, I like to think of Jeremy's wish for just "medium weather".  That is definitely MY wish, too!
• 
  
• Sometimes when I hear the heater go on in the night I remember how he used to call out in the middle of the night when HE heard the heater kick in, "Heat, Momma...Hot, Momma!" when he was first learning to talk.
• 
  
• When I walk up or down the carpeted steps and notice the pile is all flat, I think about what a great job Jeremy always did when it was his turn to vacuum the steps.  And, after I told him once that I always liked it when he was the person in charge of that job, he redoubled his efforts to make sure the carpet nap was standing at attention.  I even enjoy thinking of the time the canister vacuum got away from him and bumped down the steps at the Secrest Court house and made a hole in the wall at the bottom of the stairs.  Not so great then, but funny now when I remember the startled look on Jeremy's face.
• 
  
• Before seat belts, Jeremy used to like to lay his head on my lap in the car while I stroked his forehead and smoothed his hair.  
• 
  
• How glad I am that we ate pancakes out on the back patio for breakfast that morning because he had asked if we could.
• 
  
• And those beautiful, blue eyes!  Won't have to wait another thirty years before I see them again. Sometimes I can't wait!

              

Six months

Second Grade school picture in Berlin.  I HATED it when he          brought it home.  Now I think it is so cute.

     

Nichols Family  about 6 months before Jeremy died