Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. ~Matthew 5:4
I’m sitting on the plane leaving Sacramento airport on a Monday night.
I’m more exhausted than I’ve ever been.
This has been the craziest week and half of my life.
Saturday May 2nd I got a call that my Grandpa unexpectedly passed away. My Grandpa has been battling stage 4 lung cancer, but what happened on Saturday May 2nd caught our whole family by surprise.
See in a few weeks my cousin Courtney and I will be graduating college and my Grandpa had been planning on attending. Courtney had just spoken to him on the phone the day before and he had talked about how excited he was to come out to our graduations.
Needless to say our whole family was in shock.
In that moment my world crumbled.
See on Saturday May 9th I was in charge of a large concert festival on our campus at PLU. It’s something I have been working on for the past 8 months. I had been stressed out of my mind trying to get everything ready to make sure it all went smoothly. Not only was that going on, but since I am graduating in a two weeks I have been slammed with final projects including my big senior project called Capstone.
Because of all this stress I turned down an opportunity to go to California with my dad to see a baseball game and visit my Grandpa, a week before he passed away.
Every decision I had made about prioritizing my life came back to haunt me, had I made the wrong decisions? Did I miss the bigger picture while I was wallowing in my stress?
I talk the talk in my blog posts about making sure people know that I love them and about building up my relationships, but had I been walking the walk?
So this past week I pulled myself together and I pushed through.
I booked my plane ticket home for the funeral, I slammed out a few late nights of homework to keep up with school and Friday May 8th rolled around.
I woke up at 6:00am to begin set up for LollaPLUza and I felt at peace. All day, though all the stage set up, vendor set up, and last minute kinks, I never once felt stressed. I had stressed out for the past few months but nothing was fazing me that day. Saturday rolled around and it happened again. Peace.
Everything flowed.
And I didn’t stress.
The sun came out and 81 degrees later in Tacoma, WA, over 1000 people turned out for the event.
The biggest turnout LollaPLUza has ever seen.
An event I can say I am extremely proud of.
Sunday we did stage tear down, I ran home took a shower and booked it to the airport to catch my flight to California for the funeral.
But I was baffled as to how I was able to get through this event and this weekend without an ounce of stress.
That is until Monday night at the Sacramento Airport.
I was sitting in the car on the way back to airport to fly home to Washington and I can say I was the most exhausted I have ever been. My body was sore from all the heavy lifting, I was sunburned from the weekend spent outside in the gorgeous 80 degree weather and I was emotionally drained from laying my Grandpa to rest.
But we were standing in line for the security checkpoint. I was taking off my shoes to go through security and I heard my dad yell “HUNTER PENCE”.
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Now before I tell you the rest of the story, you need some background to understand the magnitude of what happened.
I was born and raised a San Francisco Giants fan. And this was all because of my Grandpa Pete. He lived a good portion of his life in San Francisco and raised my dad and my uncle to be huge fans of the Giants and in turn my dad and uncle raised all of us grandkids to be huge Giants fans. We would go to at least one or two games a season. And often we would go with Grandpa Pete. You can bet on game day my Grandpa was sitting by the TV faithfully watching the game. And this past year when they won the World Series for the third time in 5 years you can bet it was a great day at Grandpa’s house. At his funeral, the picture they used was one of him in his SF Giants hat, and they would have had the flowers be orange and black but they were worried it would look like Halloween.
Because of this tradition of SF Giants fanhood in my family, you can find pictures of me at almost any age wearing SF Giants gear or at a baseball game. Today I can name just about any player on the team and I’m really bummed that I will be out of the country during the majority of baseball season.
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So now back to my story.
I turn around to see what my dad yelled about and he points…..at Hunter Pence, in the flesh! Hunter Pence, outfielder for the SF Giants, king of the Yes, Yes, Yes chant and nicknamed the Reverend for his awesome motivating speeches, was standing in the Sacramento Airport Security line.
After we all got through security we went over to his gate where he was hanging out with the Giants AAA team and introduced ourselves and took pictures.
The chances of us running into one of my favorite Giants, the day of Grandpa Pete’s funeral, are SO small.
The chances of me getting through this weekend with no stress are also very small.
I have always imagined my Grandma Kathy to be my guardian angel, when times get tough I pray and I talk to Grandma Kathy. The past few days have shown that now I’ve got twice the angel power up there. Grandpa Pete and Grandma Kathy are up there dancing away, watching Giants games and celebrating their children and grandchildren’s accomplishments.
I know my Grandpa Pete was with me this weekend and I know he will always be with me. He was there in the peace I felt while planning and executing LollaPLUza, he was there when we got to meet Hunter Pence.
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. ~John 14:27-28
Even though he won’t get to see Courtney and I graduate college these next two weeks, he’ll be there in every SF Giants win, every sunny 80 degree day and most importantly in everyone’s hearts.
When I find unexplainable peace in the chaos and stress of work and life and the Race and school, or whatever it is, I know that my angels are watching over me and God is my protector.
God put this amazing man in my life as the ultimate role model. His dedication to his family and his hospitality and kindness will always be remembered.
I will always challenge myself to live in his legacy, to carry out his dedication to family and live a life full of hospitality and kindness.
To cherish the family get togethers, to cherish opportunities to see all of my family and to always have a cookie jar full of cookies on my kitchen counter.
God has two beautiful angels now. Angels who will forever watch over our family.
Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. ~Exodus 23:20
