Cousin Patricia has joined her Niall, and the ancestors...

To Patricia and Niall's much loved, and faithful, loving, tribe...  

I cannot begin to imagine what devastation you must be feeling, even as you will surely be relieved for their valiant selves that suffering is no more.  Our hearts reach out to you with love and sorrow for your enormous loss, and our best to you, each and every moment.

Perhaps all of us feel that it is unsurprising that Patricia and Niall would not be long apart.  We thank them for the rich treasure of shared memories and laughter with which we were blessed during their sojourn here.

How to find the words that speak to Patricia's beauty?  Her courage, her wit, her common sense, her grit,  her gift for living, her tenacity, her ability to love abundantly, her lack of artifice, her joie de vivre, her dedication to family, her extensive knowledge of the Punnett story, her appreciation of others, her absence of self absorption...?

There are so many reasons to rue her departure from this Earth, but yet there is gratitude that her life was full; that she was cherished; surrounded by care and love to the end; and released to peace ever after.

Blessed be,

Lisbie x

...

Oh, I have made myself a tribe

out of my true affections,

and my tribe is scattered!

How shall the heart be reconciled

to its feast of losses?

In a rising wind

the manic dust of my friends,

those who fell along the way,

bitterly stings my face.

...

Stanley Kunitz, The Layers

“If not for reverence, if not for wonder, if not for love, why have we come here?” Raffi

Dearly Loved Family,

First came the news that Beautiful Cousin Sally Kirkwood Downs had left this Earth on Monday, June 10th in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.

And then we learned that Cousin Patricia’s Beloved Niall McHugh had drawn his last breaths days later on Thursday, June 13th in Ireland.

I immediately resolved to post something to the blog, all the while holding a romantic image of us all as a human circle, embracing across the distance and time.  I wanted words filled with love and celebration and family and courage ~ an attempt to soothe and hold us close ~ which I never found a way to express that even approximated what I was feeling.  My ambition far exceeded my ability ~ in scope, and also in my desire for words that were not trite or meaningless. So much for those good intentions.

We Punnett descendants are separated and far-flung in ways that were not foreshadowed in our close-knit youth,  and we are often immersed in lives that put constraints on our ability to travel to each other. There are wonderful exceptions like Beej and Don who continue to make a point of gathering with family on different continents.  Mostly, celebrations and losses are marked in physical isolation from one another, but I believe that, in spirit, we rise above those divides, feeling abiding love and care for the joys and trials in each other’s lives.

“You can kiss your family and friends goodbye

and put miles between you,

but at the same time, you carry them with you

in your heart, your mind, your stomach

because you do not just live in a world.

A world lives in you.”

Frederick Buechner

Sally entered my life through a photograph of a radiant beauty on Granny’s shelf of family pictures in the morning room at Hope. Auntie Thelma's presence was felt in the Valley for decades after her time on Earth had ended, and she and her children were familiar through the displayed photographs and occasional news. Years later Sally came home to the Valley, but by then I was living off island. Thanks to communication technology, and her lovely Colleen, I actually came to have a few exchanges with her in recent times.

Colleen wrote that Sally was chatting and laughing with her carers minutes before she stopped breathing. What a cheerful thought to hang on to.

Niall, we have known for some half a century!  He and Patricia made of their lives together a sustained love story that bore wonderful fruit and triumphed over adversity.  Together they created a home that was welcoming, joyful, courageous, and fun… and brought inro being two generations of splendid young people ~ that’s what I always hear from people who know them!

“Niall leaves behind a life filled with beautiful memories,

stirring conversations, joy and endless love.“

taken from

https://rip.ie/death-notice/niall-joseph-henry-mchugh-wicklow-ashford-559354

There is a Condolence Book, open for messages until August 13.

https://rip.ie/death-notice/condolences/niall-joseph-henry-mchugh-wicklow-ashford-559354?page=1&records=60&sortFields=a.createdAt&sortDirection=DESC

I am sad that Sally and Niall are gone from us, sad that we are robbed of the chance to make more memories, but I celebrate that they made rich, enjoyable, good lives, and they leave us full of love and nuff respect.

The following is something I have long meant to put on the blog...

Late Fragment

And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?

 I did.

And what did you want?

To call myself beloved, to feel myself

beloved on the Earth.

Raymond Carver – his epitaph

Big Love to you all. Thank you for You.
Lisbie x

400 years in the Caribbean ~ where can our stories be found?

Howdy Everyone,

Once again, it's been a long, long time since I posted.  But I have something to share that prompted me to action!  It's a call for family stories for which I have great hopes. 

Beej's daughter, Amanda Kelley-Goodhew, and her husband have been spending time in the homeland.  Roz's daughters Anne-Marie Wilkinson Bourne and Betty Wilkinson Cathrow and their husbands visited from Barbados to celebrate Betty and Amanda's birthdays.  It feels great to think of our younger peeps being drawn back to the Valley and to each other.  

The Wilkinson girls stayed at Rachael's enchanting Spirit of the Valley (check out this cool blog post https://www.suesalves.com/blog/draft-blog-post). 

Below is a photo of a gathering there, thoughtfully shared by Rachael.

But first, here is Amanda's wonderful proposal/invitation for us to start recording the social history of our family through personal stories and memories.  Let's do it, please.  Let our family not become 'erased without trace'.

One Love,  Lisbie x

Hello Family! My mother, Betty Jane Punnett, suggested years ago that we start writing down our stories. Whether they were stories about places, or people, or ourselves, didn't matter. She just wanted to hear from us. I have many stories - about my grandfather and visiting St. Vincent when I was younger - and yet, I don't think I sent anything. And I'm a writer! So, it's no surprise that she didn't get much response from others either.

I am writing this from St. Vincent, where my husband and I are spending 3 months. Our intention is to do this every year for the foreseeable future. Being here, seeing family and places that I haven't seen in years, has me hoping to resurrect my mothers project. Only, this time, I'm not asking you to do any writing!

For anyone who is interested, I would like to set up online meetings where we just chat. If you have a specific story that you want to share, we can talk about that. If you want to talk about your life, or you have more than one story that you want to share, we can do more than one meeting. This is a very flexible project. The only thing I want is to record the meetings, so that others can see them as well. 

My first meeting was with my mother and we did half an hour where she talked about her grandmothers and the Hope house. It was so much fun.

I don't know exactly what I'll do with the recordings, but one step at a time. If you are interested, email me at amanda.k.goodhew@outlook.com and we can talk about availability and your thoughts.

Thank you in advance for your help.

Amanda

as best as I can tell, and subject to correction...

Paul Bourne,  Beej's friend, Sherice (fiancée of James Punnett), Andrew Cathrow, Kristofer Abbott, Michelle, Sophie, Tipi, Paddy, Michelle's partner Lee, Kate  & daughter Naia, Lynden, Anne-Marie Bourne, Alexandra, Betty Cathrow, James, Rachael, Amanda & husband, Don, Beej, Brenda