This art featured in my memoir, Incandescence: Rising Above Darkness is included as a moment of serenity between chapters and does not necessarily have any literal connection to the story.
Incandescence: Rising Above Darkness Chapter #38 The Light That Simmers At The Edge Of Everything
My mother did not learn to swim but wanted to face her fear of being in the water. She asked me to sprinkle her ashes at sea and celebrate her transformation, not mourn her death. At her memorial I wore white to honor her wishes. I brought baskets of fresh flowers so everyone could drop lots of color and tender blooms into the water as she would have loved. Then I poured her fine, dove-gray ash onto the bed of multi-colored petals. Her union with the ocean meant she would evaporate and rain down on us. She would join rivers and lakes and flow all around us, comforting us forever.
A sudden gust of wind blew, and I was covered by her ashes. I could not imagine brushing her ash off of me, so I turned and asked, “Who will brush my mother from me?”
My most elderly friend Jonathan Rice answered, “That will take a lifetime.”
Clare Cooley
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