Episode 54

Meghan: Yeah, well, first off, thank you. This is such a powerful story. And, you know, it’s so evident that Lorna’s the love of your eternity and that sharing her story is not easy and so I really appreciate that. One of the reasons that I wanted to invite you on to tell this story is because so many of us deal with death; death of loved ones, of family, and friends. And as a condition of living in the last days and in the times leading up to when the Savior comes, there’s going to be much more death. No one is going to be untouched by it. And for disciples of Jesus Christ I think that it’s really important for us to learn to recognize the thinness of the veil and to embrace the fact that our loved ones who might have passed on from mortality are not consigned to no longer be a part of our existence. And that in some ways, as you said about Lorna, they are even more unhindered from being able to bless us and to bless their loved ones. Can you talk about that a little bit more, where it was said in the blessing that your mother’s ability to bless her children is now unrestrained? Was it unrestrained? Uninhibited. Uninhibited. So what are some of the ways that you have seen that become true, where Lorna has been able to bless you and your family in ways that she would not have been able to if she were still here? 

Craig: Well, let me–so this was our daughter, Callie on the one year anniversary of her mother passing away–”Sunday, August 24, 2014 could have been a day that broke me beyond repair. Growing up and thinking about my mom dying young was a thought I really couldn’t even think. It created so much fear and pain in me. On this day, a year ago, my normal was forced to change. I was no longer going to see her pull up in my driveway to come say hi or take me to lunch. I was no longer going to be able to call and talk to her every day on the phone or hug her. I was never going to see her in her beautiful body again. This new normal hurts sometimes and has taken a lot of courage and faith to be okay with. This state a year ago was not, however, the last time I felt my mom’s love for me. It was not the last time she gave me advice on how to love her grandchildren. It was not the last time she shared beautiful insights with me. It was not the last time she comforted me and made me feel like only your mom can; that everything is not only going to be okay, but it’s going to be great. On this day, my mom left her beautiful body behind, but she did not leave me. I was just forced to figure out a new normal with her, a new way of communicating with her, and a new way of feeling her. This past year has been one of the most sacred, love filled learning and growing years of my life. My life is so much more full due to this experience, full of love and heartbreak, fear and peace, miracles, growth, gratitude, and all for God’s love for each of us. His love is unending and truly unchanging. I love you, Mom.” So it was a process of just believing. President Nelson, at the funeral of his daughter, Wendy–she passed away, she was 67 she passed away in January of 2019–when he made this statement to her children and grandchildren, ”She can minister to you in what I call parenting through the veil. She sees us more clearly through the veil than we see her. We cannot forget her.”– Hang on a second. I’ll say it exactly right.–”She can minister to you and what I call parenting through the veil. She can see us more clearly through the veil and we see her. We cannot forget her. We do not cease to love her. We are sealed to her by eternal ties. She loves us now more than ever. Her desire for our well-being will be greater than that which we feel for ourselves. So, dear family, stay tuned.” And as a family, we chose to stay tuned. And then songs…Lorna has been a master with songs, with tunes, pictures in our mind, whatever it might be, songs in particular. She’s been a wizard. A wizard with songs expressing how she felt and answering questions. And we have kept her present. Now, in my case–Callie called me about 18 months after Lauren had passed away, and she said, “Mom wants you to have President Butler give you a blessing.” And I said, “Well, okay.” –And it’s easy to schedule because I was his executive secretary.–And it was a blessing concerning this next phase. I knew shortly after Lorna passed away that I’d remarry because I woke up one morning and in my mind I heard, “It’s not good for man to be alone.” And I remember thinking, “Geez, where did that come from?” I knew where it came from, where’d that come from? And I mentioned it to Callie a few weeks later, and she said, “Oh, I’ve known since before I left the hospital the morning mom died. She told me, ‘Your dad will remarry. I want him to be as happy as I am.’” And I said, “Well, if that’s true, I’m not looking. I’m not looking.” So about 18 months into this process–you know, people would call, well-intentioned people, I always appreciated it–but during that blessing,  he talked about this next phase. And he described a very specific person right down to health and personality. And he said, “And it’ll be a very happy companionship for time. And then in a way we don’t understand, because you’ll love each other when death comes to both, you’ll go with your companion, she’ll go with hers. But you will have fond, eternal memories of your time together.” And in the blessing, he mentioned that she has a demure personality; she’s not one to chase a man. So I thought, “I like that. I don’t have to go online or to dances after this. When somebody calls me and wants me to meet somebody, at least I’ll go meet them.” But I need to back up; about six weeks after I’d heard that, while driving down Provo Canyon–I had played golf with a missionary friend– I had the strongest impression that whoever this person was–this is prior to the blessing–whoever this person was, I’ve known her forever. I’ve loved her forever. And in that time before time, I knew mine was going home. She knew hers was going home. And we were going to meet and run this last phase together. So towards the end of that blessing, President Butler said, as I mentioned, “Your Heavenly Father would have you be a little more proactive in this process.” 

So over the next five or six months, I went out with some fine, fine women. One of them kind of fit the profile of the blessing. And I’m saying my prayers that night–not about that–but I hear,  “She’s not the one.” And I remember stopping right in the middle of my prayer and saying, “Why not?”  I had already set a second date with her, so when on that date– it was going well–and I heard the same thing. So I dropped her off and never called her again. The lady that set us up bumped into me a month or so later. She said, “So how come you never called Linda again?” And I just looked at her. And she said, “Did Lorna tell you not to?” And I just kept looking at her. How do you say, “Yeah, my dead wife said, ‘Don’t call that woman again.’” So I remember August of 2016, I had just met another lady, I’m sitting in my truck, and I said, “You know what, hon? You obviously know who this person is. I’m through. This dating isn’t any more fun now than it was 50 years ago. I don’t want my feelings hurt. I don’t want to hurt somebody else’s heart.  I’m done. On a phone that had rung constantly, regularly for two years, never rang again. Never again. And in July of 2018–after Lorna passed away, it was obvious that people were praying for us, I decided to be a little more dutiful in this process. And because of my assignment in the stake, I was aware of people that were having difficulties. And so I would pray for them.–And I remember in July of 2018, I’m saying my prayers and I paused to think, “If I can think of anybody that I should remember in my prayers…”and Deborah Romney’s name popped into my head. When we moved to Alpine in 1988 we met Bob and Debra Romney and became friends. Some of the kids were the same age. We did some things socially with them. I found out subsequently that Deborah and Lorna were much better friends than I ever really knew. And so I prayed for Deborah, and I knew that Bob had passed away, I couldn’t have told you exactly when but for about three weeks, every night I would pray for Deborah Romney. I finally decided I should call and ask her how she was doing. It had been about a year since Bob had passed away. She was not in a real good spot, but she was doing okay. So we chatted for about 45 minutes. I told her about the blog that is part of this thing tonight and hung up. And she was Deborah Romney, Bob’s wife, a friend of 30 years. She sent me a text the next morning thanking me for the call. She’d read the blog, loved the kids. She had to go out of town but wanted to visit with me when she got back, to share a neat experience she had with Bob the day that he died. So I heard from her about eight or nine days later, we met at a little cafe in Highland, Utah, The Blue Lemon. She shared that experience with me. And then she wanted to go up the canyon to see if there were any colors. So we drove up the canyon–American Fork Canyon–and came back down, she got out of the car, then she sat back down. She said, “I got a message from Lorna while I was out of town. At least I think it was Lorna.” And I said, “No, if that was your impression, it probably was.” And then she left and I didn’t think anything about it for a couple hours. Then a couple of hours later, I’m thinking, “Now why in the world would Lorna be giving a message to Deborah unless it had something to do with me?” And then I thought, “Maybe it has something to do with us.” And then I started to see Deborah in just a little bit different of a light. So I made an excuse to go see her the next day. And we visited for a minute and I said, “So, what did Lorna say?” And she said, “Well, you know what? I don’t know what it means. I was pushed back into the car. I didn’t want to say anything anyway. I’ve regretted it ever since. So no, I just don’t want to say it.” So a bit later I said, “So what did I learn to say?” And she didn’t want to tell me again. And I said, “Just tell me, just tell me.” And she said, “I told you I went out of town.” “Yes.”  I had to use some air points. I went to Las Vegas for a Donny and Marie concert.” Bob had delivered one of Marie’s babies years ago, and they had been friends ever since. And she wanted to give her a copy of his funeral service. And a few days before she went, she said she was at some friend’s house playing games that the two of them, Bob and Debra, used to play games with. And a song–I told you about songs and how Lorna uses songs, and music–Deborah heard that song, and she said, “What’s the name of that song? I love that song.” And Dean Lindsay, one of the men there, said, “Deborah, that’s a Frank Sinatra song, ‘Someone to Watch Over Me.’ “Okay, I love that.” So her son Michael put her on the bus to go to Las Vegas and somewhere between St George and Las Vegas–she’s sitting looking out the window–and the seat next to her, to her right, is empty. That song starts playing in her mind, ‘Someone to Watch Over Me, Someone to Watch Over Me.’ So she’s singing that to herself and hears Lorna say from the seat next to her, “Deborah, you need someone to watch over you and so does Craig.” And she said she turned and looked at the empty seat and blurted out, “Lorna, are you talking to me?” And in that original conversation, I had asked her, not for myself–there again, it hadn’t even dawned on me–if she had met anybody, or had had lunch with anybody or she said, “No, she had no intention of ever getting married again. She didn’t want to take the chance of having to get to know somebody.” So she’s down there in Vegas. She’s thinking, “Geez, I already know Craig. I already know his kids. I knew Lorna well, we were good friends.” So the bus stops in Parowan on the way home. She’s eating a Subway sandwich there at the truck stop and hears Bob say, –from the same side–”It breaks my heart to see you alone. I don’t want you to be alone.” So when she gets home, she’s walking through the house, she has a picture of Bob on the kitchen counter–we all had pictures that we would talk to or I did, Deborah did–she looks at the picture and hears Bob say to her, “He’s a good guy.” And she said, “I knew exactly who he was talking about.” I said, “I know he’s a good guy. What are you trying to tell me?” And then she said when he wanted to emphasize something he would say it again a little more slowly…”He’s really a good guy.” So she said, “Are you trying to pawn me off?” So she took the picture and put it in the other room. She said, “I’m not sure what this means. Maybe it just means maybe we just need to be friends and help each other through this time.” And I said, “Well, we’re already friends and I don’t need any more friends anyway.”– That was probably a lie.–”But I think I know what it means; we should just spend a little time and find out.” And then that blessing from President Butler..He said we would both just know, words won’t even need to be spoken, we will both just know. And it was apparent very quickly that it had been set up long before we ever came here. Our oldest son, Scott–this would have been a problem for him, Lorna used to say the two of them came from the same planet, and any time that I might remarry, he would say, “Yeah, I’m okay with it.” But you knew he wasn’t okay with it– the Romneys had given him $1,000 for his mission fund back in the day. Shortly after Debra and I were seeing each other– he’s picking up one of his little boys from a football practice–a song from Lorna’s funeral comes on, and he realizes Bob is sitting in the seat next to him. “Scott, thank you for letting your dad take care of Deborah for me.” So he calls me a little later to ask me how things are going. I said, “Why do you ask?” And then he told me what he had heard. And then when he saw her for the first time, a few days later, he gave her a very long, warm embrace–and we’re not huggers–so, I know there’s no jealousy, judgment or possession on the other side of the veil, I know they want us to be happy. You know, the book that Megan has read a little bit of and the blog, the book is free, it’s online. It’s to be shared, not sold. Lots of stories in there about fingerprints, the various ways that she’s blessed our family. Now President Butler did tell me in that blessing, that when this time comes, when I meet this person, I would feel less and less of Lorna, it is the order of things. But to be ever so mindful, she’ll continue to minister to you and your family, but the decisions now would be made between Debra and I, not someone who’s on the other side of the veil. And so for four years I had–you know, I kept a journal of the times when I knew Lorna was around–I had an experience about once every seven days. But I’m a believer. I’m a believer. And if I even think it is, I don’t question it. We don’t talk ourselves out of it if we think.  And since Deborah and I have gotten together, we got married about four months later. I don’t feel Lorna much anymore, but I see her. I see her fingerprints in the family all the time. All the time. Callie has noticed that we still parent our family together. Together. So like Callie mentioned, you know, maybe when someone passes away, to forget them is the wrong thing to do. And then that statement from President Nelson, “So, dear family, stay tuned. Stay tuned.” So it has been a remarkable experience for us even to this day in what she can do. But we became believers, from when Lorna said to Katie, “I will speak words to your mind.” I believe it’s a language we all speak. We just have to remember how to speak it.”