Gathering Around the Bones
A Reflection on a Celebration of Life
This article first appeared in the May 2025 edition of The Madison Express, the monthly newsletter of the Madison County, Ohio, Board of Developmental Disabilities.
There’s something deeply ancient about the way elephants grieve. When a herd comes upon the bones of a lost one, sometimes a member of their own family, they stop. They don‘t rush by. They circle. They reach out with their trunks and touch the remains, as if remembering, asking, acknowledging. They linger.
They don’t speak, but they say everything.
And isn’t that what we do, too?
On April 24, 2025, many of us took the time to stop, linger, remember.
We didn’t gather around literal bones, but around memories. Around names. We spoke them out loud, not just to hear them again, but to remind the world that their lives mattered. That they still matter. That even though someone may no longer walk among us, their presence is still felt. Their impact still ripples. Their love still lingers.
As we sat in the audience on that windy Thursday evening, the wind chimes hanging in the tree growing in the memorial garden sang a lively tune. Susan Thompson, MCBDD superintendent voiced aloud exactly what I was thinking. Evan was letting everyone know he was there.
You see, Evan LOVED windchimes. We had about a dozen hanging in his room. When the windows were open or the ceiling fan was on, they would tinkle and jingle-jangle. He’d smile and sometimes chuckle.
After he died, some relatives sent us a windchime. And then, wouldn’t you know it, but Susan Thompson stopped by our house and gave me another one. I love sitting on the deck or patio in the evening with my eyes closed and I listen. I can hear Evan laugh and then I smile.
I have a feeling he wasn’t the only one letting the Celebration of Life audience know he was around. I believe all whose names were read, whose names are written on the stones positioned under that tree, were letting us know they would not be silent. That they would sing the only way they could now. Through the wind.
When we participate in any act of remembrance, it’s not about moving on. It‘s about holding on to stories, to relationships to meaning. It’s about honoring that sacred space between life and loss, where grief doesn’t ask to be fixed, only witnessed.
When we gather like we did in late April, we become the herd. We touch the invisible. We listen for echoes. We remember not just who they were, but who we are because of them.
And somehow, in gathering, we find strength. We draw on each other. We say, I see your grief, and I carry mine beside it. And just like those elephants, we keep going. But not because we’ve forgotten. We move forward because we’ve remembered.