The Passing of Mary Ann Williman of Medford, Oregon
Even before my eyes popped open this morning at four o'clock I was conscious of a change in me. It was a desire and a blueprint to be a better man. A man of peace and reconciliation, of propriety and and love. I'm now fascinated with studying the different words different languages have for the word love, for example. I know that in Hebrew, there are many words for love, like filial love, and agape love. There are many others, just like there are thirteen words for love in the Polynesian language. Why do we only have one word? The event that I'm thinking rocked my world is the passing of a great lady of Southern Oregon, Mary Ann Williman.
What was it about Mary Ann that her recent passing this month, September 2013, could have had such a profound effect. I doubt it was the uproarious great time that was had by her children, the children of her husband, Otto Williman, their children, and myself, by playing bunko the night of her funeral. Indeed we pledged to be a more cohesive family even though we are scattered along the entire West Coast and beyond. In comparing notes with one another, especially on events that transpired in just days leading up to the funeral, and especially the day of, we have to pause and reflect. I want to take this opportunity to reflect not on the life of Mary Ann, but on the effect she has had on the living and also on the great failing of our language, that we only have one name for that great mystery we only know as God. I think we need to clarify these things at every opportunity, it's important.
Mary Ann and Otto were more than just active in the AA movement. They were revered as pillars of the organization that changed so many hundreds of lives for the better. When Otto had his 50th anniversary celebration of the day he got sober there were over 500 people present in Medford to celebrate with him. There were over 250 people at Mary Ann's funeral yesterday. There wasn't even an announcement where or when the funeral was to be held. This is good stuff. If God is an old white haired guy sitting in the clouds, he would be clapping and tapping his foot. I very much doubt that is the case, but the family is convinced something good was expressed by the universe in her passing and as her body was being laid to rest.
The first inklings I got was when my wife, Otto's daughter Terry, and I were on watch with Otto when Mary Ann was in dire distress a week ago Sunday. I had snoozed in my chair as Mary Ann struggled for breath, succumbing to a tumor in her brain. I woke and pretty much fled for the door, begging to get home for some chores, leaving Terry, Eric, Mary Ann's youngest son, and Otto alone with their beloved wife and mother. Terry called me soon after and said that Mary Ann had passed. I have no idea what prompted me to such haste. It just wasn't natural is all I know. I am convinced that we are all connected in some way, the same way that prayers (there's another word that does injustice to such a mystery) can be effected even on the other side of the world.
Then Brian Benline, Mary Ann's oldest son, sent a correspondence about how many people in the past have noticed the discovery of dimes soon after the departure of a loved one. Brian started finding dimes in odd places. He had dropped one dime and it rolled under a vending machine in Southern California and it had rolled out and hit his foot. Keith, the middle son, started finding dimes. One one was laying smack dab in the middle of his car seat when he got in. Terry was changing purses to bring a pink one to the funeral, a favorite color of Mary Ann's, and detected something rattling around in the bottom. A single dime.
By this time they were sharing the mystery of the dimes around. Otto was apparently the most blessed in the receipt of dimes. He found four in a pants pocket and when in his car he looked down on his lap and a dollar bill had come from nowhere. Not a dime, but he was impressed nevertheless by the connection to the 'dime effect.' Even leaving the funeral, Eric quizzed the hospice nurse who had attended Mary Ann in their home where she passed. "Funny you should mention that," her husband said. "I was taking a sack of coins from the AA meeting to the bank and I found a single dime on my lap in the car."
The officiator of the funeral thought these stories warranted a presentation and Terry and Eric got up and told of the 'dime effect' at the memorial service. Otto was pleased and Terry was choking up, but they only told part of the story. After the funeral others recounted experiencing the 'dime effect' too. Maybe all the stories will be recounted in one compilation some day, or I'll add them to this post in my SouthernOregonCafe blog as I hear of them. But the story just starts here. We all noticed some things that struck us as some kind of crack in our reality, our current dimension, as one speaker at the funeral said.
What did I notice? I've been a photographer and as such I couldn't help notice an awesomeness of relevance to Mary Ann's passing as we released pink balloons in her honor on her birthday just days ago. It was a breezy evening with pink and orange tints to the clouds and we had just finished a family pizza dinner out. We sang happy birthday to Mary Ann in the far end of the parking lot and set several dozen helium balloons with little notes from each of us into the air. They didn't go straight up, but at a angle toward the Siskyou Mountains. And more accurately, right at the moon. I wished later that I had had our big camera with a telephoto lens to capture all those pink balloons with birthday wishes heading to parts of the galaxy unknown. That image is still in my head, however, and I think in the minds of many other family members as well.
What also struck me was the finale of the showing of the slide show of Mary Ann's life. The last picture was of her standing on a high bank on the Oregon coast looking out to sea at sunset. As the music, that was concluding with something like, "I'll love you forever" ended, a clap of thunder sounded just at that moment. The only one for weeks. It poured during the memorial service, but stopped and a double rainbow appeared at the grave site at the National Cemetery in Eagle Point. Otto is a veteran. Her body was laid to rest on the very summit of the hill at the Cemetery.
I'm just describing what I know to be true of the events surrounding Mary Ann's passing. However I will say that, with a renewed vigor to be a better man from the whole experience, I think it is the most wonderful testament to the life of a human being I personally have seen. Mary Ann was what you'd call 'a real hoot.' She was an organizer and maybe the mother hen of the AA on a broad scale. Not Nationally, but I do know that people from across the country have called Otto expressing their condolences. One speaker at the funeral said that "if she was on the Titanic, nobody would have died, and furthermore, there would have been snacks in the lifeboats."
From the moment of death, it's all about the ones left behind. We have no words ourselves for 'the great mystery' that surrounds us, except maybe for 'reading the red' in the Bible. The words of Jesus. He had it pegged in my opinion and I don't think anyone has ever argued with that. The fourty authors of the Bible have added their commentary and now others add their commentary to that commentary and it gets muddled up pretty good some times. But everyone knows there is a 'great mystery' at work in our lives, and hence a lot of people continue to be better people. Granted, a lot of folks ignore the signs. Look at how many people exceed the speed limits on the highways.
I try not to ignore signs. A lot of times you can't do much about it, like when I've had visions of my sons in combat. One I had was of a giant bubble of protection over my oldest and his buddies when they were going door to door in Iraq looking for 'bad guys.' He never got a scratch in two tours of duty and neither did he lose any of his men. I also had one of my Marine son when he was in Okinawa, Japan, that he was inundated by some kind of flood and that he was injured. A few months later a tsunami hit Japan and took out a nuclear reactor. Daniel was a Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear specialist and was the radiation monitor on the convoy to northern Japan to lend a hand. He took in an excessive amount of radiation working on the ground there for four months and had to take the 'purple pill.' Not good. My stories like this can go on and on, and I've written about lots of them in the past, but I only lend them here as a punctuation point.
I try not to ignore urgings to help if I can, I've ignored too many of them in the past and who knows how much good I could have done. I'm thrilled to see the extended family of Mary Ann doing so well. Brandon, one of Brian's boys, is a Life Scout, in the Order of the Arrow, and heading soon to attain the top rank in the Boy Scouts of America. The attitudes all around are marvelous, I think a reflection of the great spirit of Mary Ann, as irreligious as she was. But I don't hold that against her and I don't think 'the great mystery' does either. With Mary Ann's passing, it seems like Creation has sped up a little bit, enough for those who loved her, to notice and carry on in her tradition of shining light in dark corners with a permanent light. She painted an often drab world in many hues of color that stays with us. I think she would want us to do the same and I think that's what it's all about.
What was it about Mary Ann that her recent passing this month, September 2013, could have had such a profound effect. I doubt it was the uproarious great time that was had by her children, the children of her husband, Otto Williman, their children, and myself, by playing bunko the night of her funeral. Indeed we pledged to be a more cohesive family even though we are scattered along the entire West Coast and beyond. In comparing notes with one another, especially on events that transpired in just days leading up to the funeral, and especially the day of, we have to pause and reflect. I want to take this opportunity to reflect not on the life of Mary Ann, but on the effect she has had on the living and also on the great failing of our language, that we only have one name for that great mystery we only know as God. I think we need to clarify these things at every opportunity, it's important.
Mary Ann and Otto were more than just active in the AA movement. They were revered as pillars of the organization that changed so many hundreds of lives for the better. When Otto had his 50th anniversary celebration of the day he got sober there were over 500 people present in Medford to celebrate with him. There were over 250 people at Mary Ann's funeral yesterday. There wasn't even an announcement where or when the funeral was to be held. This is good stuff. If God is an old white haired guy sitting in the clouds, he would be clapping and tapping his foot. I very much doubt that is the case, but the family is convinced something good was expressed by the universe in her passing and as her body was being laid to rest.
The first inklings I got was when my wife, Otto's daughter Terry, and I were on watch with Otto when Mary Ann was in dire distress a week ago Sunday. I had snoozed in my chair as Mary Ann struggled for breath, succumbing to a tumor in her brain. I woke and pretty much fled for the door, begging to get home for some chores, leaving Terry, Eric, Mary Ann's youngest son, and Otto alone with their beloved wife and mother. Terry called me soon after and said that Mary Ann had passed. I have no idea what prompted me to such haste. It just wasn't natural is all I know. I am convinced that we are all connected in some way, the same way that prayers (there's another word that does injustice to such a mystery) can be effected even on the other side of the world.
Then Brian Benline, Mary Ann's oldest son, sent a correspondence about how many people in the past have noticed the discovery of dimes soon after the departure of a loved one. Brian started finding dimes in odd places. He had dropped one dime and it rolled under a vending machine in Southern California and it had rolled out and hit his foot. Keith, the middle son, started finding dimes. One one was laying smack dab in the middle of his car seat when he got in. Terry was changing purses to bring a pink one to the funeral, a favorite color of Mary Ann's, and detected something rattling around in the bottom. A single dime.
By this time they were sharing the mystery of the dimes around. Otto was apparently the most blessed in the receipt of dimes. He found four in a pants pocket and when in his car he looked down on his lap and a dollar bill had come from nowhere. Not a dime, but he was impressed nevertheless by the connection to the 'dime effect.' Even leaving the funeral, Eric quizzed the hospice nurse who had attended Mary Ann in their home where she passed. "Funny you should mention that," her husband said. "I was taking a sack of coins from the AA meeting to the bank and I found a single dime on my lap in the car."
The officiator of the funeral thought these stories warranted a presentation and Terry and Eric got up and told of the 'dime effect' at the memorial service. Otto was pleased and Terry was choking up, but they only told part of the story. After the funeral others recounted experiencing the 'dime effect' too. Maybe all the stories will be recounted in one compilation some day, or I'll add them to this post in my SouthernOregonCafe blog as I hear of them. But the story just starts here. We all noticed some things that struck us as some kind of crack in our reality, our current dimension, as one speaker at the funeral said.
What did I notice? I've been a photographer and as such I couldn't help notice an awesomeness of relevance to Mary Ann's passing as we released pink balloons in her honor on her birthday just days ago. It was a breezy evening with pink and orange tints to the clouds and we had just finished a family pizza dinner out. We sang happy birthday to Mary Ann in the far end of the parking lot and set several dozen helium balloons with little notes from each of us into the air. They didn't go straight up, but at a angle toward the Siskyou Mountains. And more accurately, right at the moon. I wished later that I had had our big camera with a telephoto lens to capture all those pink balloons with birthday wishes heading to parts of the galaxy unknown. That image is still in my head, however, and I think in the minds of many other family members as well.
What also struck me was the finale of the showing of the slide show of Mary Ann's life. The last picture was of her standing on a high bank on the Oregon coast looking out to sea at sunset. As the music, that was concluding with something like, "I'll love you forever" ended, a clap of thunder sounded just at that moment. The only one for weeks. It poured during the memorial service, but stopped and a double rainbow appeared at the grave site at the National Cemetery in Eagle Point. Otto is a veteran. Her body was laid to rest on the very summit of the hill at the Cemetery.
I'm just describing what I know to be true of the events surrounding Mary Ann's passing. However I will say that, with a renewed vigor to be a better man from the whole experience, I think it is the most wonderful testament to the life of a human being I personally have seen. Mary Ann was what you'd call 'a real hoot.' She was an organizer and maybe the mother hen of the AA on a broad scale. Not Nationally, but I do know that people from across the country have called Otto expressing their condolences. One speaker at the funeral said that "if she was on the Titanic, nobody would have died, and furthermore, there would have been snacks in the lifeboats."
From the moment of death, it's all about the ones left behind. We have no words ourselves for 'the great mystery' that surrounds us, except maybe for 'reading the red' in the Bible. The words of Jesus. He had it pegged in my opinion and I don't think anyone has ever argued with that. The fourty authors of the Bible have added their commentary and now others add their commentary to that commentary and it gets muddled up pretty good some times. But everyone knows there is a 'great mystery' at work in our lives, and hence a lot of people continue to be better people. Granted, a lot of folks ignore the signs. Look at how many people exceed the speed limits on the highways.
I try not to ignore signs. A lot of times you can't do much about it, like when I've had visions of my sons in combat. One I had was of a giant bubble of protection over my oldest and his buddies when they were going door to door in Iraq looking for 'bad guys.' He never got a scratch in two tours of duty and neither did he lose any of his men. I also had one of my Marine son when he was in Okinawa, Japan, that he was inundated by some kind of flood and that he was injured. A few months later a tsunami hit Japan and took out a nuclear reactor. Daniel was a Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear specialist and was the radiation monitor on the convoy to northern Japan to lend a hand. He took in an excessive amount of radiation working on the ground there for four months and had to take the 'purple pill.' Not good. My stories like this can go on and on, and I've written about lots of them in the past, but I only lend them here as a punctuation point.
I try not to ignore urgings to help if I can, I've ignored too many of them in the past and who knows how much good I could have done. I'm thrilled to see the extended family of Mary Ann doing so well. Brandon, one of Brian's boys, is a Life Scout, in the Order of the Arrow, and heading soon to attain the top rank in the Boy Scouts of America. The attitudes all around are marvelous, I think a reflection of the great spirit of Mary Ann, as irreligious as she was. But I don't hold that against her and I don't think 'the great mystery' does either. With Mary Ann's passing, it seems like Creation has sped up a little bit, enough for those who loved her, to notice and carry on in her tradition of shining light in dark corners with a permanent light. She painted an often drab world in many hues of color that stays with us. I think she would want us to do the same and I think that's what it's all about.
posted by Alaskacafe at 7:17 AM
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