Today at 12:04 AM was the one year anniversary of Jim's last two breaths. It's as vivid and raw now as then. At that moment last year, when we were all holding Jim and crying around his still body, it seemed so desolate and over. It seemed but a second ago. And last night, in the same room, the kids and Katie & Teddy Schaffer were all snuggled on the couch and chairs watching a movie, with candles burning, with Jack the dog in AJ's lap, and it felt so warm and safe. Oie came home from Colgate. Chris called me shortly before midnight from Cornell, we were both crying and reaching out to each other. Yes, we all have each other, and the kids have each other, their cousins, and their friends. I still have piercing painful alone moments every day, I can't believe Jim's not about to walk in the door, or he's not just beyond the bathroom door, flossing his teeth, or outside chipping ice off the driveway. That hasn't gotten any better. But I am learning to "walk on my own two feet"--ie, not racing in the moment to follow my mind's many voices telling me I need to do this or that for everyone else; nor dragging because of indecision or the overwhelming fear; but just feeling a simple call of my heart, listening to the sound it makes, the sweet flow of love that pours from it and somehow coats a layer/bubble of protection around me, and then walk in that. When I do that, living in the "third minute," ( that Maharaji refers to--not the minute that just passed, or the minute that is about to happen--he says those are the 2 minutes we're used to living in; no, there's a third minute, the one we're in right now) so when I'm walking in that bubble, there's a little hope to go on. And I love and cherish the kids dearly!

I've heard from a lot of you the past few days, thank you for that.

Love, Laurie