yesterday we said goodbye to my aunty susan (married to my dad's brother). i have not seen her much in the past years, but i have a beautiful memory of her, spending time at her house as a child.
aunty susan absolutely loved may gibbs gumnut babies. she collected any pieces from the collection she could get her hands on and had quite a lot. i remember she told me on one occasion that the warehouse that made the pieces had burned down and so, that they were very rare and hard to come by. she would show me the pieces she had as we sat together chatting. i can only imagine how excited she would have been to see how popular her pieces have become again in the past year or two, with ever so many things available now!
aunty susan never forgot my birthday and would always send me a sweet gift. i remember getting an avon "little blossom" makeup/toiletry kit from her when i was quite young and thinking i was the coolest person alive. i can still remember the sweet smell of the roll on perfume and the taste of the tinted lipgloss. she also bought one of the books in the narnia series for me, to complete my set, which i still have - and read to this day.
aunty susan was often ill and struggled with bad health throughout her life. in recent years she had developed dementia, which had saddened her family, especially my uncle russell as her health declined so rapidly at the end.
i feel so grateful to know of the promise of eternal families and to know that she will be with her russell and her family again one day. all her children were not active in the gospel and i remember asking her once how she coped. she would often write me a small note or a letter (there were many gifts of stationery over the years too, that were often used to write letters back and forward between the two of us!) and i remember she included a page with these photocopied quotes at one stage:
“You parents of the willful and the wayward! Don’t give them up. Don’t cast them off. They are not utterly lost. The Shepherd will find his sheep. They were his before they were yours—long before he entrusted them to your care; and you cannot begin to love them as he loves them. They have but strayed in ignorance from the Path of Right, and God is merciful to ignorance. Only the fulness of knowledge brings the fulness of accountability. Our Heavenly Father is far more merciful, infinitely more charitable, than even the best of his servants, and the Everlasting Gospel is mightier in power to save than our narrow finite minds can comprehend.” Orson F. Whitney, Conference Report, April 1929, Third Day—Morning Meeting 110
“The Prophet Joseph Smith declared—and he never taught a more comforting doctrine—that the eternal sealings of faithful parents and the divine promises made to them for valiant service in the Cause of Truth, would save not only themselves, but likewise their posterity. Though some of the sheep may wander, the eye of the Shepherd is upon them, and sooner or later they will feel the tentacles of Divine Providence reaching out after them and drawing them back to the fold. Either in this life or the life to come, they will return. They will have to pay their debt to justice; they will suffer for their sins; and may tread a thorny path; but if it leads them at last, like the penitent Prodigal, to a loving and forgiving father’s heart and home, the painful experience will not have been in vain. Pray for your careless and disobedient children; hold on to them with your faith. Hope on, trust on, till you see the salvation of God” (Orson F. Whitney, in Conference Report, Apr. 1929, 110).
i found so much hope in these pieces she sent me. it made me feel so much calmer about my inactive brother, who i always hoped would be a part of our family in the eternities. i am so grateful to her for sharing these quotes with me, even after all these years.
farewell for now aunty susan. i look forward to catching up in the next life. ❤
