Taking a Walk on the Path of Time

It was a path I had walked countless times before, the one that winds up the hill and is hidden away. Today, though, the view and landscape has changed. A new dwelling place was erected where open fields once stretched, standing where a run-down house had once slouched in disrepair. The landscape was still beautiful, bathed in its familiar warm glow, but with fewer trees. The birds now flew more freely, feasting among the goldenrods that lined the path’s edge.

I couldn’t help but feel a connection between this evolving scenery and the changing landscape of my heart. Life keeps moving, reshaping, growing, and building anew on what was once broken and tattered.

The new house was a striking reminder of time’s inevitable march forward, even as I felt at times as if I had been standing still, suspended in the pain of loss. Yet here, amidst these changes, God was still present. Just as He has been rebuilding the landscape of this path, He has been reshaping me—guiding me through the seasons of grief and growth. Though so much had been torn down inside me, a new dwelling place is being formed, where I can still find God living and breathing, guiding my every step.

Where has the time gone?

Time

Three years ago, I walked this same path, pushing Jon in his wheelchair. The climb felt steep then, not just physically but emotionally. It was one of those days where the weight of everything—the diagnosis, the stroke, the responsibilities of being a wife, mom, and caregiver—pressed heavily on my heart. I was navigating a new journey with time. But taking that walk felt triumphant thanks to supernatural grace, strength, and peace.

“Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”

St Francis of Assisi.

On Tuesday, when I walked here with my oldest girl for the first time in over a year, I noticed a familiarity and many changes. I also spotted a young mom in the parking lot with a jogging stroller who seemed to be struggling. My mind flashed back to that first day I was in the parking lot, wrestling a wheelchair out of the car to take my husband for a much-needed walk. Our last walk was the night before his stroke. Undoubtedly, a supernatural strength helped me lift a wheelchair out of my car and push a grown man—my husband—up and down that hilly trail on a cold November day.

As Sophia and I walked together this week, we were struck by the changing landscape and the time since we last walked here. We came here often with Jon as he progressed to being able to walk this undulating path with a brace on his leg and a cane in his strong hand. We were all changed in many ways throughout this journey.

As I encountered the struggling mom, who emerged from the blazing sunset, I pointed to my adult daughter and shared, “I used to push her just like that.”

I thought, “Time is a thief.” The young mom said it was hard work to push that jogging stroller as she picked up her pace to get up the hill.

I don’t know why, but I surprised myself with my reply, “I know, I used to push my husband in his wheelchair here.”

I am unsure if she heard me or if my voice faded into the wind, but the words hung in the silence.

Then I remembered reassuring Jon—and myself—on our first walk here, my voice tinged with irony and resolve: “I’m fine pushing you up the hill. After all, I spent years pushing many kids in their jogging stroller.”

Jon chuckled, “Well its a lot harder to push a grown man in a wheelchair, than a baby in a stroller.”

Hard Work

It was hard work, but Jon would never know that.

We shared a small laugh, a quiet moment of strength amidst the storm we were weathering. In that moment, I felt connected to both the past and the present, to the years spent mothering young children and the reality of caring for my young husband Jon as his health deteriorated. The path was the same, but everything about our journey had changed.

I’ve been reminded again of many of those painful realities this week. The reminders of our life together—strokes, seizures, tumors—have resurfaced in unexpected ways, stirring emotions I thought I had neatly tucked away. Grief is like that, isn’t it? It arrives unannounced, reminding us that we are still healing, still walking uphill.

The irony wasn’t lost on me. Encountering the mom struggling with her jog stroller—the identical thing that Jon and I joked about three years ago—shows me that God is always in the details, sending us consolations.

Three years later, I am no longer pushing Jon, but I am still walking this path, retracing steps that feel both familiar and foreign. Sometimes, life comes full circle in the strangest of ways. The hill I once struggled to climb, literally and figuratively, felt less steep today. My legs burned less, but my heart still stings with grief.

Though so much had been torn down inside me, a new dwelling place is being formed, where I can still find God living and breathing, guiding my every step.

And yet, the memories clung to me like shadows—reminders of the journey Jon and I shared and the one I continue to walk without him as the sun illuminates my steps as it sets behind me, beyond the rising and falling hills.

As I stood there, watching this mom draw strength to push her baby and herself up the hill, I had silently bonded with years before and felt a supernatural peace about facing time and the ever-changing seasons of life.

Changing Seasons

I couldn’t help but reflect on how much has changed—not just the landscape with its new construction but my own heart. The fields are more open now, less tangled with trees, just as my heart feels a little less tangled with grief. With its quiet beauty, life is making space for new things to grow, just like the goldenrod welcoming the birds or the cleared land building a new place for a family to dwell.

The path remains, but I am different. I am no longer the person who looked up at that hill, overwhelmed by the weight of a wheelchair and the gravity of illness. I am someone who has been reshaped by loss, who has learned to keep walking even when the road is hard and the climb is steep. I am still learning who I am as time marches on. In moments like this, time stands still enough to notice the changes and how I got where I am.

In the quiet moments of that encounter with the young mom and her jog stroller, I realized that life continues to move forward in all its painful and beautiful complexity. The hills we climb, the people we meet, and the struggles we carry become part of the same journey. The landscape may change, but the path endures.

On Tuesday, I walked that path with a lighter load yet still a heavy heart. Not because the grief is gone—it never truly leaves—but because I am learning to carry it with me, to hold it tenderly, and to honor the love and life I built along the way with someone I lost. And in that moment, seeing the young mom where I once stood with Jon, I felt a strange sense of peace.

Life continues to be built and grow, moment by moment, season by season, even as we walk the same roads that hold our memories and hopes for the future.

For everything, there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and to pluck up what is planted.
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to tear down, and a time to build up.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance.
A time to scatter stones and a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing.
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to cast away.
A time to rend, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak.
A time to love, and a time to hate;
A time for war, and a time for peace. – Ecc 3:4

Closing Thoughts

Memories of the joy we found in the smallest growth and tiniest steps help us keep going, but I can’t help but reflect on and revisit significant moments to process the magnitude of the trauma and loss. Just this week, we were made keenly aware of the weight of what we faced when a “reminder” of the harsh realities of strokes, seizures, and terminal diagnoses affected our hearts and souls. Walking someone through a cancer journey like this is often difficult to comprehend while you are walking through the fire.

Survival mode and grace and mercy from God, were the only way to get through.

During that time, the landscape of our lives was marked by trauma, uncertainty, pain, and unnecessary burdens.

The changing seasons have a way of sneaking up on me now. Their familiar scent in the air reminds me of all I carried in my heart and on my shoulders as a caregiver and now as a widow. Each transition reminds me of the heavy cross I carry as I climb the steep hills. The changing seasons help us peel back the layers, allowing us to heal and grow.

October 2021 challenged me in ways I’ll be processing for a long time. As if a brain cancer diagnosis wasn’t hard enough, caring for Jon through his stroke recovery during his final days was both the most difficult experience and the most beautiful gift. It was a profound union with Christ at the Foot of the Cross, living out the vows we had professed in the Sacrament of Marriage.

October 2022 carried its own weight as I clung to the cross in prayer and tried to remain as hopeful as possible while knowing we were facing the last treatment options for a growing tumor of an aggressive, recurring cancer diagnosis.

October 2023 met me with shock and numbness as we faced our loss while trying to adjust to a new life. We were still in survival mode—and in many ways, we still are. Amid the withering petals, we did our best to find ways to keep blooming and growing.

This October, we are holding space for how grief rips us open as we bleed once again. It expands our hearts and magnifies our loss. I’m still not sure time really heals wounds of this kind. We just grow around the wound as it integrates into our lives.

The trauma of that time in October 2021 (and the loss of Jon) how we walked through life will forever change us and the course of our lives. I still can’t comprehend most of what we experienced. I am grateful I was prepared with faith.

As I look back on these past Octobers, I see not just the pain and trauma we endured, but also the ways God carried us through each season. Each year brought its own challenges and heartaches, yet with every step, I’ve been reshaped. The grief, the love, the struggle—they’ve all become woven into the fabric of who I am now. Though the wounds remain, I’m learning that healing is not about erasing the past, but about growing through it, integrating it into my life, and finding moments of grace. With each passing year, I continue to trust in God’s presence—He is in every changing season, gently guiding me along this path of time.

May you, too, find moments of grace in your journey, trusting that healing and growth will come, even amidst the struggles.