I Need to See Where He Breathed His Last

I need to go to Luverne, Minnesota to see the place of Justin’s fatal accident. I have tried to put it out of mind and it continues to resurface.  I have been reflecting on what calls me out there, why do I need to walk the highway, see the pond, walk through the marsh and reeds.  Why do I want to see the place where the tow truck driver, Phil, knelt and prayed over my boy’s body as the firefighters pulled him from the submerged vehicle?

Doug went right after the funeral, he had to go to the vehicle, take the title to the towing company, he took a lot of pictures and walked the scene.  He and Phil went to lunch, Phil could be family there is such a strong resemblance between he and Doug, but then again, Phil did become family.

I can imagine the blue sky and the flat ground of the area, I also picture it dark and wet with rain, if I could see where he breathed his last breath. I was there when he breathed his first, we are never alone at our birth. I know that spiritually we are not alone when we die, but in the temporal reality he died very much alone.

I must not be alone in this desire to walk the ground and to see the place where a loved one dies. Why do old soldiers go to Normandy, why do young ones go, why do they gaze out at the now calm beach? Why do people visit Pearl Harbor to watch the tears of oil rise to the surface?  They go to remember, to honor, to grieve, no one questions their presence, their leaving flowers, their tears. We all feel a pull to honor our beloved dead and often times that takes us to the place of their death. We need to see what they saw, breathe in that same space, that hope of capturing some elusive essence of their breath in that place. I do not believe that there is ever closure, some wounds heal from the inside out, there is always a scar that denotes that place of entry of an event that changed your life.

We seem to be hardwired for pilgrimage, to go that place where we know we are find something, a piece of the puzzle.  I think we all have a homing device planted in our soul by our Heavenly Father, sometimes it takes awhile to realize that all that restlessness of the heart is our desire to return to the house of our Father. I suppose by going to Luverne, I hope to catch a glimpse of that portal that Justin stepped through, that door to his Father’s court, to know for myself that there is peace in that stretch of highway, to place flowers, to honor that joyous, short life, to grieve that short, joyous life. To give that place one last look over my shoulder and then move on.