Who will remember?

    I've mentioned before that with most situations I am prepared for what I might be walking into.  The first time I was in the church we had her funeral in, I was ready. It was still hard, but I was ready. Having to to back to our Dr. office just a week after we buried her, and seeing the chair she sat in, the room she was seen in last, I was ready. Even when I had to unexpectantly take John to the ER just two weeks later and having the same nurse work on John that had just worked on Brittany, it was so hard, but in a way I was ready for it. For me, it's the little things I'm not ready for that are sometimes hardest.
     Brittany had always loved reading, and had wanted a magazine subscription to some of the dumb teen magazines. I don't like the message they send to young girls, so I kept putting her off. I was excited though when she became interested in the Reader Digest. That was something I could approve of, and she would like the feeling of having a magazine with her name on it, come in the mail every month. So several weeks before Christmas, I ordered her a magazine subscription. It was supposed to start right around Christmas, so it was perfect. Obviously, Brittany never saw Christmas or her presents. We actually donated her presents to a girl that wasn't going to have a Christmas that was Brittany's same age. That part was fairly easy to do since Brittany had never seen them, and there was no emotional connection to them. But by the time Christmas rolled around, I had forgotten about the Digest. I went to the mailbox one day, and there it was. Her name on the label, just like what she would have wanted. That was hard. I held it in my hands for quite sometime, seeing so clearly what her expression would have/ should have been. I wish I could have been able to share that moment with her.
     Today I went into a French bakery here in Cedar that, until this last week, didn't even know existed. As I waited for my crepe to be made and I was glancing around at the store, I couldn't help but wish I could show it to Brittany. She would have loved to see the Eiffel tower name tag holders they have. She would have loved seeing the chef hats, and to hear the French accent the owner has. She would have loved eating authentic French pastries. I wasn't quite ready for that...
     John and I were talking tonight, and I was thinking out loud with him, trying to figure out how to put in words why I think it is so much harder, emotionally, to lose a child that is in their teens v.s. a child that is grown and has kids or grandkids. I was saying that as a child, we as parents are still used to revolving our lives around them. We are used to waking them up every morning, making sure they have everything they need for school, driving them wherever they need to go. We instinctively listen for them at night while we sleep. As they grow up and move out, it eases us out of that routine. We will still worry about them, and still want to help them however we can. But they won't be here in our line of vision the whole time. They will start to carry on with their own decisions we will find out about after they have already made them rather than helping them through the decisions. And then came the moment I wasn't ready for at all. I had made the realization that we, as grieving parents, the only thing we want is for our child to be remembered. Our children will remember us when we have left this life. Our grandchildren will have memories of us, and will pass down our traditions. But for Brittany, and other children who die, once the immediate family has passed away, her memory will be lost. She wont have traditions to pass down. She won't have any of her lullabies  sung to her own children's  babies.  There will be no wedding dress to play dress-up in. There will be no recipes of "grandmas famous cookies" in her handwriting. No weekends at grandma's that will be looked forward to all year long. She will be gone like the fading of a shadow as the sun sets and darkness creeps in.
    To me, this loss of remembering is what is most heartbreaking and terrifying. In a year from now, will anyone still remember her laugh? In 5 years from now, will anyone laugh at her jokes she didn't even realize she was telling?  In 10 years from now, will anyone remember the way she would tell a story and make you feel like you were a part of it? In 30 years, when her friends are gathering for class reunions, will her name even be recognized? All the things that made up such a beautiful girl, will they fade away and be forgotten? How can a life that was so bright and bold be extinguished and ignored over time? How can I make sure my girl is never forgotten? When she has left such an imprint on my heart, how can it ever be the same without her?