22 years of Lighting a candle on this day, campaigning and educating for a better day on our roads. The Plea for healthier families with the sheer goal to leave families unaffected by roadway tragedy.
Learning of its heartache and its joy in community, yet not the community any of us want to be “in.” Families for Safe Streets National
(WDoR) World Day of Remembrance, a powerful day to come together in love and profound and vulnerable sadness for what would never be.
The price Mark and my brother and our families have had to endure is unfathomable to those that will never “get it.” I pray YOU never “get it.”
Drive Well. You have a responsibility of not only protecting yourselves but others. Your mindfulness matters.
Enough of waking up 22 years later in complete silence, with a pit in my belly, as to my own need to be Whole again.
I am not even sure what that means as the race has been long and hard in spite of my authentic advocacy and will to make “life better on our roadways.”
I WANTED and WANT more than anything in this life to be a “whole” mom. My daughter deserved to see consistent laughter, the love and friendship between me and her dad and she deserved to know what a really good Dad looked like.
I never got to be a complete wife. I never got to see Mark become a dad and he never got to see me become a mom. There simply are no “family traditions” at holiday times.
There is complete ugliness that gets left behind at the crash scene that can never be “swept” up. It carries with all those affected in individual hearts and souls.
It debilitated my brother both physically and mentally. He can NOT find a new way to live with his mental and physical injuries.
Families never “bond,” as there is just too much sadness that is trapped inside some. Its not anyones fault that has been affected. We all handle life and love differently.
The birthdays, anniversaries, holidays we will never know what they would have been like as the torch is carried forward in authentic love to just find a new way to breathe.
Road Tragedy STOPS EVERYONE in their tracks. A CARELESS moments decision “ROBS”lives in the ones that die and the ones that are left behind. In the stark “blink of ane eye.”
Again, Families become unintentionally broken, a daunting new path is set before us; where there were two to make decisions now there is one….which way should I turn, how should I handle this situation, the house, the cars need fixed? How does one handle all of this alone. The one “she” needs the most; she misses. To share the beauty of their daughter that they effortlessly “made” is replaced with profound silence.
The other “She” deserved to have her dad with her on this journey. Our beautiful daughter deserved to be born into an environment full of love and life; not sorrow and brokenness.
If you are reading this and you DRIVE anything less than mindful; STOP!
YOU have the power to help US ALL STOP this devastating madness and preventable act! YOU are too good to be making devastating decisions that will alter and change the trajectory of someone else’s life. That is SELFISHNESS at its HIGHEST PEAK!
We are ALL too good to live a life of Family brokenness; because you just couldn’t wait. #StopOnRed
We have the choice to end a life or save a life. The Choice is 100% yours!
I pray you choose life!
I chose AUTHENTIC LOVE for my daughter, Mark, my brother and my family and close friends. I chose LOVE but it will never mean it has been EASY. It has been HARD.
But God chose to carry me, to equip me to do “hard things” these past 22 years, to “carry” life alone and raise a daughter on my own that I would NEVER say I was “equipped” to do has only come from his goodness and grace.
All for our beautiful daughter that deserved to be born into an environment FULL of authentic Love and Life; not sorrow and brokenness everywhere she “turned.”
In spite of everything, In the “storm” love was born. Our daughter is and always will be the beacon of hope in action in this life.
God gave me a choice and promised to “never leave me or forsake me.”
I forged on with my then infant daughter to make a difference to do all that I can to “drive down this insatiable” heartache on our roadways.
To put all the authentic “feels” into advocacy so that someone else’s little family will not have to endure this type of heartache. The hope is that many families have been left unaffected by our work.
With this mindset I will joyfully live through this incomplete heartache for the rest of my life knowing God will always be there to catch me when my deep, anxious vulnerability of this life creeps in.
I will not allow this heartache to steal my joy. Mark and our love and the gratitude of being left with a beautiful beacon of love in our daughter who amazes me daily with her support, compassion and love still inspires me to be a part of the solution on our roadways.
Remember, we all have the choice to end a life or save a life. This #WDoR2025 practice better driving decisions, look out for others not just yourself so that you too may be a part of the SOLUTION and not a part of the problem.
To all of my fellow advocates that are living this life of family tragedy, I love you, I love your will, your grace and your strength to keep going strong in your loved ones honor for one more day…..
I thank God always for his goodness that fills ME daily.
Mark, one thing for sure I will love you for the rest of my life, I am not pining away, I am living and I will live and be loved again one day, if God chooses. Never the same but nonetheless loved.
One thing is certain! I will protect, support and cherish our daughter to my fullest for the rest of my life. God is fluently working in her life and I am privy to watching it all unfold.
Your memory is etched in this 22year of #WDoR and I will light a candle always and forever on this World Day of Remembrance for as long as there is “life” in me.
