Three is most definitely “my” number … or 33 … or 333.
- Vern, Jeremy and I were a family of three.
- Vern, Jeremy and I were each 33 years old when our fathers died.
- After Vern died, I began waking at 3:33 each morning for months.
I don’t know why I started waking at 3:33.
I did have to set my alarm for 3:30am on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays to get Vern up and ready to head over to the dialysis center. We did that the final eighteen months of his life so perhaps that’s where it started.
But I’ve also thought just maybe that is the actual time Vern died and that’s his ‘hello, I love you’ to me. We watch medical tv shows and see them call the time of death like it’s an exact thing. But in real life, that’s not how it works. I was lying in bed asleep next to both Vern and Jim when they died. I found them when I awoke and didn’t immediately alert the hospice nurse or call 911 – so the times on their death certificates are definitely not their actual times of passing.
Last Friday would have been Vern’s 85th birthday. I spent the day with Jeremy and we enjoyed sharing stories and remembering that wonderful man. He was 69 when he died, so very vibrant before cancer arrived, that it’s hard for me to imagine what ‘old’ Vern would be like. I like to think he’d be a very vibrant old guy. I was looking through my Facebook memories on that day and was surprised when I saw the number on the jersey Vern was wearing in one of the photos.
I had to run a couple of errands that afternoon and as I got to the stoplight just out of our neighborhood I couldn’t help but notice the license plate on the car in front of me. Traffic was heavy. I headed in one direction, that car in another … and yet 10 miles later, there it was again right in front of me.
I’ve never been into numerology but this number thing has caused me to do some googling on it.
The number 333:
- Reassess where you’re at in your life and focus on the decisions that will help shape your future.
- An indication that you should move forward and welcome opportunities for growth and development with enthusiasm.
- There’s something important you need to know at this time of your life
- You are on a path of spiritual growth
- You are surrounded, protected and loved
Those are some pretty powerful statements. I think i need to do some journaling around all of that.
So even now, more than 15 years later, I do still occasionally wake up at 3:33. And since I don’t know exactly when Jim died either, I’ve added him to that wakeup alert. And I just smile, say hello and I love you to both my Vern and my Jim and try to fall back asleep.
Addendum: I just looked at the clock on my laptop as I finished writing this blog post and was getting ready to copy it over to the blog … yep, it’s 3:33am. That actually made me laugh out loud here alone in my dark house. So it wasn’t a wakeup alert since I woke at 1:30 today but I couldn’t help but say “Hello, I love you” to both Vern and Jim.
