There is a song that has a line in it that says,

“On the wings
of a snow white dove
he sent his pure sweet love,
sent down from above
on the wings of a dove.”

It was the first of June and all over the USA people were looking forward to warmer days and summer. In Florida it is was the beginning of our “rainy” season and I don’t know what it is about days of rain that make me feel on edge.

I kept going to the door to see if there was a sign of the rain letting up. There was a dead palm tree in my front yard and I was planning to have it removed but there was some kind of a vine growing on it and it looked kind of pretty. I had noticed that a pair of doves had a nest under the vines so I decided to wait to have it removed. All the rain and wind proved to be too much for the old dead palm tree and that day when I looked out I saw that the tree had fallen over.

I watched the pair of doves sitting on the downed tree. They were cooing a different sound that when they are mating, or just communicating with each other. It was a low deeper sound and they were going back and forth and up and down the tree stump.

After the rain stopped, I went out to inspect the tree and saw two little white eggs on the ground cracked!

A week after the tree had been removed, the pair of doves were still coming back to where the tree was, cooing; some times the male was not with the female but he was on the house top, like he was giving her space. Every day they were here—on the roof top, on the ground, in the hole where the tree was.

This does confirm that in all things there is a time to grieve. I don’t know how long it will take for the doves to go through the death of their babies, but I am sure in “time” they will survive and maybe in this story you’ll find hope and know it takes time to survive the loss of your child.

To give someone a “dove” it is to offer peace, love, calmness, stillness.

This was near the time in June when my daughter Eraina had her accident. Was this a sign from above, coming to me on the wings of a dove?

My mother is with Eraina and with my son Joe. Her name is “Dovie” and Eraina’s name has “rain” in it.

I am always looking and listening for a sign…

-JoAnn Whorley