Janie B. Cheaney: The things we leave behind

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NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Tuesday, November 25th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Here’s WORLD commentator Janie B. Cheaney on what’s left when a loved one dies.

JANIE B. CHEANEY: My husband was a collector of whatever interested him at the moment. It might be guns. It might be paintings or prints that took his fancy at a flea market. After we bought our five acres it was antique farm implements to hook up to his tractor. Most of all, model railroad equipment: boxes and boxes of diesel engines, steam locomotives, track, and rolling stock stored under his 8x12-foot layout.

When we moved out of our farmhouse three years ago, most of those collections were gone, either given away or sold. Except the model railroad. All those boxes came along with the layout, first to our temporary house, then to our permanent home. By then, though, Doug was well on his way to forgetting his oldest enthusiasm. He never asked about all the equipment I sold. He watched a stranger come and dismantle the layout and carry it out the door without a word of protest. I think he had forgotten what it was for, not to mention the hours of time he’d spent painstakingly laying track and wiring switches.

Since August, Doug had gotten progressively weaker until two Mondays ago, when he closed his eyes. We thought then that he had only a day or two to live but he breathed on, slow and steady, until late Friday afternoon. Then he opened his eyes and looked at me one last time. I told him I loved him. He took three, maybe four, breaths, each with long pauses between. And then he was gone.

While he was still here in those final days, growing progressively weaker and more unaware, his possessions meant nothing and his hours were cluttered with morphine, lorazepam, mouth swabs, and wipes. But now the few remaining things he owned are weighted with memory. There’s the cap he bought at Hobby Lobby emblazoned with Psalm 90, verse 2, because he remembered God. There’s the 2x4-foot seascape he bought at a DAV thrift store, because he remembered beauty. There’s the handmade candle holder he bought at a children’s craft fair, not because he liked candles, but because he liked children. Those were impulse purchases, not deliberate ones like his collectables, but they all speak to me of what remained in him after so much was gone.

My collectables are furniture, books, craft supplies, fabrics and trims. I hope to use or ditch most of it before my kids have to, but I wonder how much, if anything, will remain of me. We occupy space while moving through the world, but in the end we’re limited to an 18-inch urn or an 8x4 plot of ground. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, but I’m not sure what that means. I don’t think it means instantly reunited with loved ones who’ve gone before; that joyful meetup will probably have to wait for our bodily resurrection. But present, in that my late husband lives in the mind of the Lord who shepherded him so gently into eternity. Lord willing, he’ll live in my mind too.

I’m Janie B. Cheaney.

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