The five months from December 2009 through April 2010 were among the most difficult of my life. My brother, not yet 47 years old, had emergency bypass surgery. No one had any clue that anything was wrong at all. (He came through the surgery without further incident and is doing well.) In late March, my sister was diagnosed with breast cancer. The biggest shock of all came in early March. My mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. A few short weeks later, she was gone.
As you would expect, I am left to struggle with the grief of a jarring and unexpected loss because of a brutally efficient disease. I would not be human otherwise. But strangely, this experience has not been an entirely negative one. You see, my mother was at peace with the remarkable life she lived, her relationships with her family were strong and fulfilling, and she was exactly where she wanted to be with her faith.
Lynda Lyle Tate put her creative energy into painting with watercolors. She shared her art primarily through her Madison Avenue Art Gallery and her classes. Before I left home, I had the opportunity to take a few lessons from her. For someone from a technical profession, the experience was always a little disorienting. I would visualize the masterpiece on my blank canvas. As the actual image took shape, it drifted further and further from my original vision. When I despaired that things were beyond my ability to fix, Mom looked over my shoulder and told me what she saw. After a few flicks of her talented wrist added darks to accentuate depth and highlights to add clarity and detail, I would realize that I had not been too far astray at all. It just took a gifted touch to bring back my creation from the brink of disaster. Then, I would throw my excited arms up in victory and tell everyone in the class about this thing I had created, not yet realizing that each member of the class was going through their own private burst of joy.
After a little while, I learned that Mom was working on another canvas as well. Through her church and through her profession, she’d find broken people. Encountering a lost spouse here or a troubled marriage there, my mother would bring them into class where she would use the paint and paper to slightly open a door that had been slammed shut. As we spent our last week together, person after person would come through her room devastated at the thought of losing their teacher, but Mom would tell the perfect joke or offer the right word of kindness, comforting those who came to comfort her. I got to meet the human canvases who had been put right by the master and gone on to do great things. It was a humbling experience.
When I told my mother that I would dedicate this book to her, she said that she would like that, but she had nothing to do with computers. That is true enough. The very thought of Windows would leave her helpless. But Mom, you have had everything to do with me. Your well-timed words of encouragement inspired me, your love of creativity shaped me, and your enthusiasm and love of life guide me even now. As I think about these experiences, I can’t help but feel a little better and a little stronger because I, too, am a canvas shaped by the master.
This book is dedicated with love to Lynda Lyle Tate, 1936--2010.