April fools day

Hard to believe that one year has gone by since riding in the car and getting the phone call about Jan!
April fools day was a special day to us when Jan and I were married. Actually before we were married and shacking up together..I pulled the usual tricks on him..tied shoes, celephane on the toilets, rubber band around the rinser at the kitchen sink. I called a truce by pulling him in close and kissing him with both hands on either side of his face. What he did not know was that I had soaked my palms with green food coloring, donned some gloves immediately, drove to the light house restaurant and watched with delight as people stared at him and poked fun while he struggled with what had gone wrong. Another year he retaliated by planting a full water balloon in the fridge, bulging with the expectancy of spilling at my feet. However I opened and closed the door to get the cream for my coffee so quickly that the balloon remained....perched in emergency. When finally I re-opened ...the balloon fell softly, bouncing several times on the floor, rolled to Jan.....He picked it up..hucked it at me, where upon I caught it and threw it back bursting at the seams and soaking his exhausted attempts. Those were the days of love and laughter.
That was the energy that created three sons.
Caleb still asks for his dad, and I still struggle, like the balloon, in the telling of the tale.

On this day...To my sons I would like to say...all of our life comes to us in narrative form; it's the story we tell. Change the story and you change your life. Do not tell the story of how hurt you are that he is gone, but instead speak of how much you have learned from him. Do not speak of how you cringe when someone else speaks of their father, but cherish and proudly shout out about who he was to you in the short time you shared his life. Tell the tale of how he affected you in positive ways ...speak of his kindness and of his energy. Speak of his stregth, that is now inherently yours. Like inscense and the past tense, he is gone..and yet he remains in you in so many ways. Hear him in the wind, ride upon his strong shoulder when you crest a wave, hear his pounding heart with the rhythm of your hammer. He remains..he remains...always in love with you as I witnessed in his eyes when he first held you. It would be one of the few moments where he let down his guard and loved fully. Change your story about your father..be proud and hold your heads up high knowing that you took from him all of his best attributes, all of his qualities that will be remembered. He lives on in you. Be mindful..and remember his goodness...you too are loved just as well. Take the wondrousness of it all to a place you can call home.. And I too will chersih him for you. Your mother.

I attended a concert tonight with Caleb and as I was leaving, a friend of mine shouted down from the balcony, which made me look up instead of down to where I was going and I totally missed the stairs which were smack dab in in front of me. I was in high heels (of course) and I danced my way down - missing two..maybe three stairs at a time...contorting this way and that...never twisting an ankle, and I almost ate shit at the bottom, but by the grace of God, I instead crashed into a closed door, composed myself as best I could, and turned around to see a smiling Caleb watching me still from the top of the stairs.
It was in that moment that I realized that I was laughing.......I had struggled myself to joy!
After all this time, it was a realization that you may find silly - but I recognized tonight that Caleb would not want me to be so sad. He, as he was tonight , was laughing right along with me..witnessing the spectacle I had made of myself, and was enjoying the simple joy of joy!
How could I have missed this?- of all the people in the world, Caleb always knew how to laugh at himself, and at others in a way that would allow them to find the humor in any situation!

I am going to bed now..and tomorrow I am going to laugh a whole hell of alot more!

Oh heavy, heavy heart. A brave and respected woman I know has decided that rather than stay on life support and put her kids through hell, she will instead choose death! I sat with her this afternoon..her veil thinned blue skin radiating under duress, her strength shouting through her eyes, her determination lit up by the heavens. Her children close by, sitting , waiting, expecting, hurting. I realized that it took such pin point precision courage for Caleb to fight his way back to life, and tonight I lay witness to a woman with the same courage; choosing death. I saw her study her children's faces, one by one,as if to memorize them, I saw her smile ever so tenderly as each of their eyes met hers. I watched as she spoke to them in whispers of no words.

I walked away from her room a forever changed person.

A life interrupted. I went for about 4 or 5 years without my feet on the ground following my divorce, and now I am on year one and 3/4 with 3 more years to go with Caleb's accident - perhaps more, perhaps less. It seems daunting at times..and as if the years are fliiping over like calendar pages at others.
Someone said to me the other day in the most kind manner " I have never known anyone so unlucky" But I say that some of us choose our paths and are all the more daring for it......and I think the whole Potter/ Lindsay clan has taken this event on..because we can! What lessons we will learn from this! Yes this tears me apart and threatens in the middle of the night to devour me whole...but for the most part, I am emerging as if from a cocoon..... at first beaten and battered, wet and tired, hardly the material to write home about........ and then when I feel I cannot go on again, I open my eyes and I find I am armed with the most delicate wings with which to fly!
We are moving forward, if ever so slightly.

hello mum- good to hear some news from home. I'm glad the bowling goes on and I am so happy that Max is having fun and that he has Lara to keep him excited and interested.
so- I think we have an idea of what's to happen. We go back to Bali tomorrow morn. We will extend our visas 30 days, but Shaye and I will return on the 25th of March or so. I would like to be home for the 1st. One year has gone so fast. We are well, $ are holding up, I am surfing well and having fun. We will set out on our own to Sumatera as soon as we can get out of Bali. I miss you very much and hope you are really ok. I think often of how close you and I are, but also that in recent times, we have been unable to really get into it; we skim across the icy surface, distributing our weight as to avoid breaking through the fragile layer that serarates us from an entire frozen sea of pain. But I would like to break through with you, because we both need to and I am sure, because I trust you fully, that we can pull one another back out. We have to fall through sometime, and better together; alone.. I dont know I would find my way back up.
I love you, respect you and admire you more than you could ever understand. if you were aware of how profoundly you have shaped my life and given me the tools required to extract meaning and happyness from this often heartless life, you should be proud of yourself as a mother and a friend indeed.
I love you. be well, tell caleb I say hi and I love him and miss him. I will write him an email once back in bali. love you both. kai

Dearest Kai and Max,
I want to speak to you from the heart. I have been experiencing great sadness surrounding all of what has come to pass in our lives. I have been sad that Caleb is lost to us as he once was, and I know this breaks your hearts as well. I can see it in your eyes when you look at him. I am sad that your father chose to leave us when we needed him the most. I sense this loss in your souls when someone speaks his name. I am sad that we will forever be changed. Caleb is very alone now on his journey.... he struggles daily to regain some sense of what has happened to him and why he is the way he is today. He prays each night that he will see again out of his left eye and will hear again out of his right ear. He is sad as well. In his saddness I see his determination and his fight. He is a warrior of the strongest kind because he is full of love. That is what defined him prior to his accident and defines him now in his healing. He is and always will be full of love.
The inevitable has happened.. most of his friends have stepped away, and this is said not with blame or guilt attached to it, but just with more tears as I know how much people, his friends in particular, have meant to him. I have learned something from this. Caleb always put everyone first - even before himself as you know...much like your father did....and now (for the most part) he stands alone . I have learned that putting yourself and your happiness first is the most important thing you can do in your lifetime...follow your bliss. No-one else knows what is best for you...but you do! Because of this trajedy I want more specifically, almost with a certain urgency, to impart on you the idea of following your heart ..against all odds and against convention. Bliss guides you and tells you when you are on the right track. Your emotions back that up. I want to know that you will try to generate different feelings from this day forward, because by doing so you will make everything right that has been wronged.
Be the creator, the generator of your life. Find something in all of this that makes sense and heals you......and know in your hearts that I will forever be at your backs!