We did good, right?

Sonny and Ty in 2011

This summer, after Lou’s mother suffered a serious heart attack, my father-in-law was able to embrace her after she was extubated and lucid again. “We did good, right?” I heard her say through her loving tears, foreheads pressed together.

“Yeah. We did good. The kids are good. We did good.”

At the end of this crazy, beautiful, life, a mother just wants to know that she did good. A father wants to know that his kids are okay. Facing their own inevitable sunset, it’s all they cared to validate. That they were good parents. The kids are alright.

The last conversation I had with my father-in-law, Sonny, was about Ty. We were in the hospital visiting mom, and he was so upset watching her sleep in the hospital bed, knowing how uncomfortable she was. I hadn’t seen him cry like that since we lost Ty. It makes sense, of course, as we sat there reflecting on all that Ty went through, and what mom was going through in that moment. Sonny said that he couldn’t stop thinking about those days in the hospital with Ty, and how unfair it was to watch a tiny little boy suffer like that. In between words he held back his cries with guttural restraint, but he couldn’t stop the tears. Being in that situation again was just so triggering. It fiercely and mercilessly ripped open those wounds, leaving us both so heavy and breathless.

His sadness was eating away at him like cancer. His heart was broken beyond repair. Days later, Sonny was gone. He left us to be with Ty.

Life is so hard. Watching a child go through treatment for years and losing him the way we did… there is no recovery from that.

Even though we miss Sonny beyond words, we are at peace with losing him. Mom is getting stronger every day, and we are lucky to have her living with Lou and I on alternate weeks because we’re spending quality time with her. Of course, being at peace doesn’t mean we are without sadness. It’s been brutal.

The other day I was walking in my yard, which is what I do when my thoughts start getting the best of me. I walk, I recite the book “we’re going on a bear hunt,” and I look for ladybugs. Anyone who has read my blog knows that Ty always sends me ladybugs. I started talking to Sonny and Ty, telling them how much I miss them and how abandoned I feel. I wondered if Dad would have a sign of his own. A feather? A dragonfly? Mom had already been seeing red cardinals so that’s what I hoped for. Eventually I sat on a bench, and I waited for Ty and "Papa."

Something bright red caught my eye in the bushes. Right there in front of me was the brightest red bird I had ever seen, small, with black wings. Almost resembling – you guessed it – a ladybug. Like a red cardinal and ladybug combined. Could there be a more obvious way for them to show me that they are together!?!

The bird stayed for at least two minutes, which is a really long time for a bird! It bounced from branch to branch. It allowed me to get close and softly say hello. I’ve never seen a bird like this before in my life, so I looked it up.

Turns out, Scarlet Tanagers are among the brightest, most beautiful birds in an eastern forest, and also one of the most difficult to find as they stay high in the forest canopies. Apparently, it’s known among birdwatchers to be almost impossible to spot because they forage in leafy upper branches high in the forest.

I do not live in a forest. Nor was the bird high in the trees. He came down to sit in those branches just to show me that they’re “doing good” and everything is going to be alright.

For Sonny and Carol… you did better than good. You did great.

A Scarlet Tanager (credit: Columbia Daily Tribune)