A self-restoration in time for Mother’s Day?

I've had some interesting experiences, to say the least, since I've embarked on cleaning up and restoring my family properties.

Inherited following the death of my big brother, Mark, in a house fire in 2015, I had been unable until recently to devote my full attention to these sites.

My dad, Art, passed away in 1995 following a courageous battle against cancer. My mom was killed in a car accident on Highway 101 six days before Christmas in 2001.

She had left the family properties to Mark and me. My big brother and I came to have a great relationship, although we never were able to see eye-to-eye on what to do about the properties. These included the house we grew up in and the surrounding land and the multi-generational family woodlot that my dad had loved so dearly.

The situation with COVID19 has presented me with unique circumstances: the time to go back and reflect on certain tragedies in my personal life. Also, the time to take on some restoration projects that I feel are important to the history of my own family - and others.

I hope other people experiencing emotional turmoil over the loss of loved ones might find some nugget of spiritual inspiration within this column.

In 2017, with the floors collapsing and a serious raccoon infestation, I made the difficult decision to halt recovery efforts at the Starratt family home that had sat abandoned for 13 years.

I felt a nagging like there was more meant for me to discover, more items I was meant to save. The only thing was, I didn't know what those items were or why I felt so compelled.

I decided against a sense of dread to go back into the house at least one last time. I felt drawn to what used to be the dining room.

My eye went to what appeared at first to be a chunk of the decaying wall plaster. There were hundreds of them laying around. However, one, in particular, seemed odd. It looked to be shaped like a heart.

I - like the floor - risked falling into the basement in a successful effort to retrieve it. Like many other items, it would sit for months awaiting me to have the time to investigate further.

When I finally got the chance to look more closely at the object, the plaster that encapsulated it had dried. I began chipping away at it.

The object was, indeed, a wooden heart with a plastic stand.

I carefully washed it, removing the plaster while trying not to damage the underlying finish. I could see pink and green paint and the traces of words, but what the object said wasn't readily deciphered.

Over the coming months, I noticed something that amazed me. In hindsight, I wish I had used time-lapse photography to document it.

As the heart object sat on what used to be my mom's nightstand, more and more letters slowly became legible. Within weeks, I could read the message. The object had, somehow, unexplainable by me, restored itself. It read:

"As we grew throughout the years, amid the laughter and the tears, the special feelings we shared back then exist today, my sister, my friend."

The heart was a gift that I remembered was given to my mom by one of her sisters, probably for her birthday, in the early 1990s.

This resulted in a powerful feeling. Something was telling me that I was right in trying to save what I could of my family's past. There were important messages within the pursuit meant not only for me but for others.

I hope to learn which of my mom's sisters gave this heart to her. Once the pandemic has passed, I would love to be able to return it. This is what I believe was intended.

Delivering this message on her behalf was meant to be my Mother's Day gift to Mom in the year 2020. And her gift to her siblings - including brother Harry - to let them know they remain, as always, in her heart.