October 29, 2024

Monday brought us wind.

Before I experienced the wind myself, I heard whispers of it from several people. Parents and teachers alike tumbled into school on the gusts they’d felt at home. The wind! The wind! It was a game of telephone– the wind traveling through the ears of families across Goleta and Santa Barbara to eventually reach me at Rocky Nook. Late into the school day, leaves began falling more rapidly. By afternoon, my curtains were whipping wildly by the open door. I felt a resistance to it, like it was blowing in an impending grief I was not yet ready to meet.

I’ve always disliked wind. It is the great agitator; it makes me feel unsettled and irritated. I also acknowledge how deeply important it is. It moves things that need to be moved– seeds, water, pollutants. It creates energy where it otherwise doesn’t exist. It is the bringer of change, and, frankly, change is quite often irritating, unsettling.

Monday morning I also received a message from Lindsay’s mom, Jodi. She was replying to a message I’d sent Lindsay over the weekend, letting me know her family was keeping a vigil on Lindsay. 

I stared at the screen, reading the words again and again. I looked up the words, “keeping a vigil.” I know what it means, but I wanted it to mean something else. I wanted it to mean something other than imminent passing. I wanted the story to be different. I wanted the wind to go away.

In retrospect, I knew what the wind meant. It meant it’s time. Change is coming. Nature has its course, its unfolding, and an inevitable part of that cycle is death.

Tuesday afternoon, after the wind had settled, I received a message from Jodi that Lindsay had passed.

This week, I want to honor the memory of this beautiful woman. 

I met Lindsay almost four years ago during the latter half of our first year in existence as A Thousand Mornings Forest School. Her son, Lev, came to us a heart-filled, stick-wielding, wildly creative, dramatic-play master. At that time, we still met at Douglas Family Preserve under a gangly fig tree, we lovingly named The Octopus Tree. Upon arrival, Lev would immediately fall into play, while Lindsay would land on the tarp with baby Eva in her lap, who was always grasping a paintbrush, so eager to be involved even then. They would often stay late into the morning, just chatting and enjoying the morning sun. 

I can distinctly remember the first day they visited, the feeling of having known the three of them always. Some relationships grow over time; some feel like the sudden illumination of an inextricable tether between two hearts, and my relationship with Lindsay was the latter.

Lindsay was kindness embodied. She was patience, a gentle pace, a soothing voice, an easy sense of humor, a quiet power, humility, creativity, resilience, hope. There is often a certain rosy glow, an enhanced vibrancy, with which we speak about the deceased, but with Lindsay, I felt that vibrancy every single day of knowing her. In her presence, it was so easy to feel soft and seen, welcome and celebrated, just as you are.

She radiated this energy in everything she did. When Eva started attending forest school our third year as a program, she gestured to write a letter introducing her family to our community, as a way to answer the frequently unasked questions about her headwrap and Eva’s physical differences. Knowing that people struggle to talk about our differences, or sometimes avoid those conversations entirely, she just willingly greeted that invisible question mark with such incredible warmth. She invited people in, welcomed questions, guided our friends in the appropriate language to use, and really ultimately just removed the taboo and invited curiosity when it arose. In my experience, this was how she lived her whole life– with such a generous and open heart. She took places where one might justifiably have defenses and woundings and found ways to create connection there instead.

Lindsay’s deepest connections were with her children and her art. During the brief moments Eva was at school that weren’t consumed by cancer treatments, Lindsay would often go out into nature to watercolor. I remember her sharing this as if it were a casual pastime and then one day becoming the recipient of her stunning creations. Without explicitly knowing it was a particularly challenging time in my life, she gifted me a painting of some pine trees by the moonlight with the quote, “Here I sit beneath a tree; Heartbeat calm, soul hums free.” She felt into that tether between our hearts; she felt into it through art, beyond words, with her heart and offered her art as a small poultice for my wounding. It is just one small story of the extent of her intuitive brilliance.

Mostly, she loved her babies. She advocated for them, trusted them, celebrated them, truly enjoyed and relished and honored them. It is evident in both Eva and Lev’s confidence, their humor, their creativity, their joy. They are embodied reflections of such a present and invested mother. She carried a calm mama bear energy about them both– always willing to listen to the other side of challenging situations they might be facing in relationships at school, but also fiercely protective. Throughout this harrowing journey of cancer, when asked how anyone could help, her only reply was to love her children. Play with them. Hold them. Listen to them. Be with them. It is the kernel I am carrying with me forward, the way to continue to honor her memory. As a community, we will continue to shower these children with love and listening.

In the scope of life, I spent very little time with Lindsay. I can’t tell her whole history. We had long drop offs, school camping trips together, occasional summer swims with our families, and often scheduled extended parent-teacher conferences just to be together, but relatively speaking, it was a short amount of time we were physically together. What I do know is how she made me feel– the energy she radiated so effortlessly out into the world. She made me feel safe, seen, appreciated, abundantly loved. She was the perfect example of sharing love freely and the ease with which that makes it possible to receive it back. She was reciprocity. She was love itself. She was a mama, an artist, a friend, a peacemaker, an inspiration, and a deeply beautiful woman.

Lindsay, my creative, beautiful, soul-filled friend, you will be so missed. I am so grateful for our time together, for the indelible imprint you left upon this world. 

The wind blew in and carried you on. I have no doubt that the seed of both tenderness and power, creative energy and ease you brought to this world will continue to grow. Your goodness has nourished us all and will continue to do so as the seasons change. I love you. May you rest in peace.