On Blue Birds and 500 Miles

“Take that beautiful light that I see in you and you go. And you shine Jennifer.” That was my grandma’s last command to me before she left us this past winter.  She sat on her couch bundled in a blanket, cancer quickly taking her body, but never touching her heart. Her eyes held the intensity they always had and she held my hands while she told me what I was to do. I stopped trying not to cry and just let it happen, she smiled at me, both of us understanding this was our last time together.

My grandma was always a soft-spoken and gentle woman, but if you ever needed someone that would love and fight for you, you wanted her in your corner. She never gave up on you and saw the person that you always had wanted to be and she believed you would reach it. Just as she believed her beloved blue birds would return each spring, she believed that we would achieve great things. As another so eloquently put it she was “a woman who stayed grounded so that others could fly.”

To honor her memory and show our deep gratitude to Holland Hospice for their care of my grandma, my mom and stepdad are doing a charity 500-mile hike from Denver to Durango. Please look at their site http://bluemileadventures.com/ and take time to read about who my grandma was to her family. Then learn about what the Blue Mile 500 really is, because even though my grandma is gone, her legacy lives on and inspires us to be grace, be change we long to see, and to take each of life’s adventures.