08 May 2004
Jeffrey
In recent months I have found myself talking to Carrie frequently. I enjoy spending time with her even though it is only in my mind. I think also that I am struggling to work out how she and I live and walk together now and in the future. She is still herself, warm, generous and irreverent. For the past few months, I am struck that I no longer feel the need to be focused on the responsibility of being her father but instead she can be a fully grown adult who is a peer as well as a daughter.
During recent months I am also struck by Carrie’s wisdom. I am sure that walking so closely with death for so long gave her insights that the rest of us only see dimly. When I speak with her about issues that trouble me, Carrie often just laughs at my concerns and recommends I just focus on what is important and ignore the rest. She is a wise girl.
I am very very proud of Carrie. She lived and died with such intense integrity. She believed passionately and lived in absolute integrity with those beliefs, regardless of the opinions of her peers or others. She was not demonstrative but quiet in her commitments. She revealed her beliefs through her actions rather than words; smiling radiantly at a stranger, listening to a friend, sending a note of thanks, raising money for a group, going bald to a party, supporting and defending the outcast.
She attracted people who were like her, quietly living deeply held values of service, commitment and zest for life. I am thankful that I can see those pieces of her still here in her friends and her family. She had and has such wonderful friends. I want to thank all of you who have contributed the comments and memories about Carrie. Marybeth and I have, of course, read all of them. For me it is so important to read your memories of her so that I can keep her as complete as possible in my own mind when I walk with her everyday.
I think about Carrie at all times of her life; sometimes as a baby, or as a young girl, or in her last few weeks of pain. It is interesting - sometimes days will go by when I only think about her as 3 years old while other times I just replay her last few days.
Lately I have been thinking about her cartwheels. I had not thought about them at all until a few weeks ago and now I keep seeing her whirling in circles on the lawn, the playground, often upstairs crashing into the bookcase. She was probably around 9 or 10. She would ask me to critique her style – “Daddy watch me.” She would ask. “Was my left foot bent on that one?” Long and lanky, she would fly by so fast I had difficulty making any distinction. But what I saw was this beautiful little girl arching across the lawn, so determined, so enthusiastic, so focused on this little thing. “That was perfect.” I’d say. “ Everything was straight.” On rare occasion she would agree and beam, “That was a good one. That was great.”