Thanksgiving and prayers of salvation for the life of Susie Mitchell. My grief is taking me many places I never thought I would go Susie. I cannot somehow fathom that I would receive your Christmas card and wait for you to arrive for a visit, but you did not. Of course the card speaks to me in your voice...I can hear the excitement of how we planned to visit each other throughout the winter.
That first night that I received the tragic news of your death, I could walk through my apartment and see you in the gifts that I treasure, the Christmas ornament you had custom made to look like my guitar, the jar of seashells we picked up on the beach one morning near your condo at Jensen Beach, and the hurricaine lamp you had incribed, "Just You, Me and God".
My shock is silent. My eyes are fixed. My tears come quietly at first, then loudly when I think I am alone. I stood over your grave in Culpepper and cried out to God, "I do not like this."
My song for you, the one that you like so much, I am giving you again. There are moments I cannot sing it through the tears or with much of a strong voice. But, somehow the words offer God our voice, together, understood, if only for a moment in eternity.
I know that God has healed your broken body and made you whole. I know that God has given you the answers to all the questions you had, especially about your birth parents. I know that God is blessing your adoptive parents, Vivian and Art, two really loving people who parented you when you were just a newborn needing love.
I am trying every day to go on. I know you understand as I do, that we were better friends than husband and wife. Neither one of us ever took that friendship for granted. We gave all that we could to each other in a friendship that offered unconditional love. I thank you and God for that.
Here is the song I still sing for you
I CAN'T RUN OR HIDE
- Rick Price (Jan. 1994)
Baby, you got me
Still thinking about you,
The years went by I did not know
What to do.
The places I went
And, the things that I did,
Were just excuses
As I kept my heart hid.
Chorus
Baby, you and I know
That only love can turn the tide,
When your eyes meet mine
I can't run or hide.
Then one day
All that did change,
I could not believe it
But life is so strange.
Just when I knew I had no further hope,
You showed up again,
When I was at the End of my rope.
Before I knew you
There was no light,
And when you left before
My heart closed so tight.
To see you again
Did make me cry,
If not for you
I'd have no blue sky.
Rick Price
