RCMP - Our World Became Quiet
I watched you today; your face a blur in a picture before me.
I could not see clearly from my distance but I know that it must have been you. I had never met you; never touched your life with any special thing I have done for you. I had never said hello to you or shared the story of my life with you. I had never taken your hand in mine and told you just how thankful I was to have you near.
I never looked at you as a Mother’s Precious Child, a child who was born and lived and laughed...... I never saw you grow up to be the magnificent person you truly grew up to be in my world. I left my world in your hands as I lived my days; all the while knowing you would be there for me if I ever needed you. I laid my head down on my pillow at night and never did I think of you as you watched over me in my world.; as you watched over as a light in the darkness.
And when that day came for you, and you fell.... I was not there.....
It was a brief moment in my life that seemed to last forever; I held on to it; I wept! The time did not pass; no past or present could I feel.... My world became quiet. The birds did not sing; no breeze against my cheeks.... Only tears. The sky in my world was not blue and the sun did not shine. The pain in my heart belonged to me. I could not give it up nor would I give it up. I held on to the memory of your beautiful face before me.... someone I had never known.
And I asked myself, why? Why did you leave the way you did? Why wasn’t I there when the world became quiet? Could it be that I no longer see you as a blurred picture but as a person who you needed in your life to make your world a safer place to be?
And then, I ask myself ....
Why did it take losing you to realize that I failed you? Who was I to think that you never needed me as a friend or someone to watch over you? Who was I to not have cared enough ; not have cared enough that we could have walked arm in arm together to make our world a better place to be ? You died defending my world!
I know that when my tears are gone, I may never again see your face before me but I will carry the picture of you; I will carry the picture of all four of you in my heart forever! And, I will be truly thankful that you were there for me; asking nothing in return. And it is on this day when I say, “Thank you Constable Peter Schiemann. Thank you Constable Leo Johnston. Thank you Constable Brock Myrol. Thank you Constable Anthony Gordon....
It is on this day when I ask that you watch over me still.... From above where Angels rest! I will walk forward. I will pick up your light and lift it high; I will find my way through the darkness! I will fight with the strength of your memories; knowing that others now share my journey; knowing that others walk , with their personal conviction, walk by my side!
My feet may not always carry me on the road I must take but I will not be defeated in the fall because.... I will walk in your footsteps for you; I will walk with a new belief that we as people of Canada, can make this world a better place to be. We can walk arm in arm with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police because we will walk in the footsteps of Hope for a Better Tomorrow. Then, when we look back at the path of your footsteps and remember you, we will not see where you fell.....
We will see a lighted path of footsteps that have no end !!!!
