Looking for Kari.....found Kassidy

I thought I could find it. I have never been there exactly. We got there too late to ask the office for the location. It was just as I was heading to get my daughter from school that I realized I really wanted to go leave something at Kari's grave. She'd been on my mind so much yesterday. I figured we'd get home and wait for Bro to get off the bus and then we'd drive in to the teacher stores and get some sort of "teacher gift" that we could leave. Apple...ruler...something. In a hurry, we found a little apple and borrowed a Sharpie from the lady at the store to write on it. And we headed to Oakwood.

Since we were too late and the office was closed, we first went to the precious baby area....unfortunately through a couple friends, I knew where that was. I quickly found Kassidy. My daughter was asleep in the car but Brody and I looked around close by in case there was a "lucky" opening close by when Kari was laid to rest. Nope. Drove a bit to newer areas. Really had no clue. We meandered. We appreciate cemeteries....we tend to linger when we go...reading headstones and talking about who we find and just how beautiful and touching some graves are.

We drove a bit more and then, of course.....one kid had to go potty. Quickly. @@ Well, as big as Oakwood is and it being a school night and well, our impending urgent need to get going, I decided to drive back to Kassidy and leave "Kari's apple" with her. I took a quick snapshot in case it blew away or was stolen in the night.

After we got home, I emailed Kari's Mom to ask for directions to Kari's grave for future reference and to let her know I was there. She tells me exactly how to get there.....in a such a quiet detailed way....like a Mother making her way to her daughter. Then she tells me she was also there today to leave flowers for Kari and Kassidy. Turns out....we were there at the exact same time....just passing each other and not even knowing it.

Received a comment on this post and I wanted to include it here so it wouldn't get overlooked.

I was there too! We all missed each other. I had a hard time remembering where to find Kari. I had gotten out once and my son and I looked. When we couldn't find her we drove around some more eventually ending up where I thought she should be and called Linda. She said they had just left and Jim told me what to look for. Turns out we were right there both times, just didn't go far enough in. I wondered if I would be the only friend who would stop by to visit. It is nice to know I wasn't. I fixed the flowers that had falled over and prayed with Kari as we had done so many times before she died. My son, bless his heart, even walked away saying "I'll give you some alone time with your friend. Two years is a long time." I kneeled by her side and just sat peacefully.

Kim