Simple objects, such as my bracelet and my picture serve as symbols for one of the most important people in my life. My little cousin, Cole DePriest, died on April 3, 2015, just a day after his eighth birthday. When he died, everybody’s lives were changed. The bracelet I wear says, “Cole DePriest Walking With Jesus”. I wear it at all times, except when I have to take it off for athletics and when I shower. It is a constant reminder of how precious he was to me, and to everybody for that matter, and for the miraculous events that followed his death. After he died, strange things kept happening that could only be little signs from God. A few of days after the incident, Cole’s best friend, Jett, came home from school and told his mom that one …show more content…
He looked so happy and joyful in the picture and that’s why I like it so much. It is a true representation of his personality and how outgoing he was to everyone he met. When Cole died, everybody’s lives were affected. It was all so sudden and unexpected that it just left everyone speechless and in shock. I remember the day it happened. I was shopping at the mall in Longview with my mom, aunt Michelle, and cousin, Lauren, when my dad called me. He said, “I just thought I would call and let you know that Cole had a horse riding accident and he didn’t make it.” When he said that, I just stood silent on the phone, unable to process what he had just told me. I thought I heard him wrong at first. “Cole who?” I asked in shock. “Colette’s Cole. He was riding horses and his horse tripped and fell on him. He didn’t make it.” I didn’t know what to say, there were no words. I remember getting off the phone with my dad and I just started bawling. Right in the middle of the mall. I really could not process what was happening. I had just played basketball with Cole two days before that. He had just turned eight the day before. How could this happen to him? And why? I told my mom what happened and I went to sit in the car while she finished checking out. Lauren came and sat with me and I just cried. I started getting texts from people, and seeing tweets and posts on Facebook about it and it just made me more upset. When I got home I just went and laid in my bed for the rest of the day. I’ve never had anybody that I was close to die, so I didn’t really know how to handle it. Cole’s funeral was the second funeral I’ve ever been to in my life, and it was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. So many people I knew and loved all in one room full of people crying. When I first saw the casket I remember thinking “Caskets aren’t supposed to be that small.” It just didn’t seem
N.T. Wright: During my first semester at Northwestern College, I was assigned the book, “The Challenge of Jesus” by N.T. Wright for one of my Biblical Studies courses. This book and every other book Tom Wright has written has dramatically impacted my Christian faith. Dr. Wright has not only defended the basic tenants of the Christian faith, but also has shown how an academically-minded pastor ought to love and care for his or her congregants. N.T. Wright was previously the Bishop of Durham and pastored some of the poorest in the United Kingdom. His pastoral ministry has helped shape his understanding of God’s kingdom-vision which he is diagramming within his magnum opus “Christian Origins and the Question of God”. This series has instructed myself and countless other pastors to be for God’s kingdom as we eagerly await Christ’s return. Additionally, I have had the privilege of meeting with N.T. Wright one-on-one on numerous occasions to discuss faith, the Church, and his research. I firmly believe Tom Wright is the greatest New Testament scholar of our generation and he is the primary reason why I feel called into ministry.
When I was twelve years old, a close friend of mine passed away. At first, I didn’t know how to process what was happening. How can someone I’ve known for the majority of my life be gone? But then it finally hit me. My friend was really gone. There would be no more days challenging
This bracelet means a lot me, it can be compared as “objects that are as evocative as snapshots. They’re documents, but they can’t be reproduced” (last name, par. # ). My bracelet is special to me because it is the first bracelet of la virgen, a bracelet that I bought from a sacred and spiritual place. When I am feeling upset, worried, or scared, I hold on to this bracelet and seek guidance and protection from La
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman is a nonfiction book that brings to light the clash of Hmong culture and Western medicine in Merced, California. Anne Fadiman tells the story of a Hmong immigrant family, the Lees, and the unfortunate condition of epilepsy that their daughter Lia suffers from. Throughout the book the reader sees great conflict inflicted on medical practitioners due to the Lee’s own cultural beliefs and the frustration suffered by the family due to miscommunication. Anne develops the story by giving a detailed background of the Hmong peoples’ lifestyle in their indigenous land of Lao, how it contributes to their beliefs, and their struggle to understand and accept Western practices.
The Pilgrimage of Grace, 1536, was a rebellion which was the result of Henry VIII’s religious reforms which aimed to provide Henry with more control of the church. The Pilgrimage of Grace is significant in many aspects. These are that it was the first rebellion to have religious causes, the rebellion united the whole of the north of England and that, it is the first rebellion to have demands presented from the rebels and that it posed a great threat because of its scale, the pardon for the rebels came with conditions. The most important aspects are that the rebellion had such a strong common cause, it was able to unite the North of England and that it was the first rebellion
I’m glad we have Maurice, my mother’s younger brother here today. Ella, her older sister, unfortunately couldn’t make it, but I know the news of my mothers death hit her hard. And I know that she prayed with all her will, for my mother.
Collins uses visualization, emotions, and comparisons within several natural and man-made objects in respect to all the victims that tragically passed away that dreadful day. By specifically identifying several individuals in this poem, Collins found a way to honor those people that died on September 11, 2001.
In “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down” by Anne Fadiman, the whole story revolves around Lia, the thirteenth child of Lee family. Lee family was a refugee family in USA and Lia was their first child to be born in US. At the time of time of birth, she was declared as a healthy child but at the age of three it was founded that she is suffering from epilepsy. In the words of western or scientific world the term epilepsy mean mental disorder of a person and in Hmong culture, epilepsy is referred to as qaug dab peg (translated in English, "the spirit catches you and you fall down"), in which epileptic attacks are perceived as evidence of the epileptic's ability to enter and journey momentarily into the spirit realm (Wikipedia, 2014)
There are certain objects, places, and people that remind me of those who have passed away. My loved ones that have died live on through my memory of them. Some days my
The name. The epitaph, banal and meaningless. The dates of birth and death--dates too close together for comfort, dates that stir murmurs in passersby. How tragic. Poor boy, to die so young.
During the past few days, many of our friends and family have come to our home to show their love for us and for Arlyn. I have been especially moved by the fact so many of her teachers and principals have shown up and cried with us. I am also touched by the love her young friends had for her. Our memories of this sad time in our lives will therefore not all be bad.
Months past since the last time we’ve seen each other. Months since the time I saw him giving it his all during conditioning. Words cannot describe how much this person impacted the lives of many people in my hometown of Smithfield, RI. It was mid-November. My brother was heading home from college and I picked up my brother from the train station. He distressingly broke the news to me about his sudden passing, and my heart dropped to my stomach. During the whole ride home, I was too nauseated to even speak. I wanted to believe that I was simply having a bad dream. I cried myself to sleep that night. I had school the next day and wasn’t able to function properly. Walking through the crowded halls, I watched all of my classmates walking to their classes in tears. As the announcements came on through the intercom, I could hear the sorrow in my principal's voice as he was speaking about weekly events. I had continuous flashbacks of the cheesy jokes he used to tell, his lustrous smile that brought happiness to others, and his curly perm that he never wanted to cut. I just wanted to stay in my bed and let every single tear drain from my glands. I went to the candlelight vigil for him the next day. Almost everyone from the town attended with a candle. The iridescence reflecting from the candles illuminated the sky with an angelic glow. I felt like he was there next to us at that moment, smiling for what
A couple years after he passed, my grandmother on my dad’s side bought me a curio cabinet with a glass casing and six shelves. It was her’s and my mom’s idea for me to place things in there that belonged to dad or things that my dad have given me that I wanted to preserve, yet still be able to see regularly. This is where the cactus skeleton and the cotton that I mentioned earlier in this essay are currently. Along with those two things, I have many more objects that were once my father’s, and held by him in his hands. Not only do I have objects, I have his notebook that he wrote in while he was out driving. It has a bunch of random writings in it, of numbers and what seem to be nearby stores at whatever location he was at. My mom even gave me some of the post-it notes that he would
(Funnel Rita, Koutoukidis Gabrielle, 2009) The group members were then asked to get in group of twos to identify their significant individual loss and come up with a poem or song to express how they feel about the loss. Process: During the session, the group members identified that their significant loss was a parent or grandparent. Through songs, poems and dance, they expressed how they felt about losing their loved one. Group 1 Song and dance: Grieving is troublesome and can lead you to do something gruesome, that it is harder to deal with if it’s a parent or grandparents because they love you.
Life is filled with lessons, and often times there are little reminders to keep those lessons in our minds for later use. Sometimes lessons learned in life are learned the hard way, like in Cole’s instance. One of the lessons Cole learned is in order to heal he must first right his wrongs; stop blaming those around him for his problems, and to forgive. To Cole, these were just cliché sayings repeated on and on by others around him who didn’t trust. He always brushed these words aside thinking he could do everything on his own and life only revolved around him. After being mauled by the Spirit Bear and having to survive on his own, he began to open his eyes for the first time. He began to grasp it was not anyone’s fault but his own he was stuck in his position. Cole finally started to recognize if he held on to his grudge against his father he would never be able to let go of his horrible past and start living again. Most importantly, Cole learned he could never live with himself if he did not help Peter Driscal. I think this life lesson Cole learned will forever be symbolized by the Spirit Bear. Without the bear, Cole would have never learned integrity and being trusted is real power, not the fake power of freighting people into doing what he says.