“Do you believe some essence of your Dad can see you?” I asked this question of Tim when we were relaxing out of the rain in an Argo Tea shop downtown Chicago. Thinking of my own Dad, death, and after-life, my question came out of these thoughts.

“And what is meant by the phrase from the Apostles Creed, ‘resurrection of the body’?” This question Tim wondered as we conversed about these things.

One time when Tim was making sculptures of Temma, his Dad still living then, suggested to Tim that he make a sculpture of Temma after the resurrection. What would that look like? Tim wondered. Any different from what Temma looks like now?

Maggie Hubbard, a friend and a painter whose piece is pictured above, (maggiehubbard.wordpress.com) is depicting objects and spaces left behind by her Dad who died suddenly about a year ago. That these objects and spaces contain some essence of Maggie’s Dad that she realizes as she paints, a body of work, this I believe.

In the Church room where the Pastor who led my Dad’s funeral service met with our family before the service there was a big butterfly flapping its wings furiously at the window wanting to get out. “Is that butterfly inside or outside?” the Pastor stopped to ask.

“Inside,” my sister answered as her granddaughter squealed with delight up close to the sight. When the Pastor finished his prayer with us, my brother-in-law and two grand-nieces scooped up the butterfly and let it go outside the church. It flew up and away over the church building. It was a sight to behold.