July 20th, 1962.

Today on this day, 52 years ago, my youngest sister, Ludwina was born. She was 5 years younger than me, and committed suicide by hanging herself with a heavy lasso when she was 35, three months shy to the day of turning 36, on April 20th, 1998.She was a very beautiful child, with eyes full of life and mischief. I remember how fond she was of her milk bottle, and ice cream, and I also remember she cried often and easily, and was quite adept at cheating at board games at a very early age. I was 19 when I left Belgium to go study in the US, and at the time Ludwina was 14. I would like to think we knew each other well, but that was not the case. When she turned 21, she came to the US to study as well, to TCU, in Fort Worth, Texas where my brother and I both had attended before her. By the time she started there, I was in Austin, going to graduate school at the University of Texas. I met and married my Californian husband there in 1986 and we moved to Washington State in 1988. Ludwina seemed to be doing just fine, struggling with relationships, but otherwise doing fine, going to graduate school and getting her master's degree in economics. Then things started to spiral out of control for her. I will never forget the phone call I got from her about a week before my son was born, in July 1992, where she was telling me how she wished the voices in her head would just stop. We talked for 3 hours, me desperately trying to keep her on the phone, because I knew my parents were trying to get to her apartment before she thought of leaving again , going off alone frightened and confused.They had called me just minutes before she did, asking me to please keep her on the phone as long as I could, which I did successfully. They got there while we were still talking on the phone. My sister had been diagnosed with bi-polar depression about a year earlier, and would take up the tragic habit of going off her medication, in a desperate attempt to prove she was fine, only to end up in the hospital each time for two to three weeks. Before she hung herself with a heavy lasso my parents had bought in the Grand Canyon in 1973, and that they kept in their garage in their house in Georgia, where Ludwina was staying after yet another hospital stay, she had tried to poison herself, and tried to slash her wrists. I was stunned to realize she had found the physical strength and know how to throw a heavy lasso effectively and deadly accurately over one of the heavy wooden beams in my parents garage where she hung herself in April 1998, on the 20th of April, 3 months to the day before she would have turned 36. She struggled with unsuccessful relationships, and with drug and alcohol addiction. The alcohol was a very familiar demon on my mother's side of the family. It killed my mother in the end, as it had two of her three brothers. I last saw Ludwina in 1996, when I visited her and my parents in Georgia, where she was already living with them. She seemed so sad, so unreachable, and I was far too cautious, and hesitant. I should have hugged her more, cried with her if that was what she wanted. But she was so proud, so eager to behave like she thought we wanted her to. I simply did not know what to do, and I got no guidance from my parents. She was a very bright, beautiful young woman, who got trapped in her own mind and in some very pernicious family intrigue and politics. What went through her mind, as she swung that lasso over that beam, standing there in that deadly silent garage on that hot Georgia day, all alone ready to jump into that void, wearing nothing but her bright blue bathing suit. How did she keep her balance, barefoot, high up on the rafters of that garage, what was her last feeling, her last hope, her last wish? My son, who was 6 at the time, and I went to her funeral. It was a hot day, with blazing blue skies. I kissed her cold forehead goodbye, as she lay in that coffin, with a scarf draped around her neck, to hide the dark bruises where her neck had snapped and the lasso had bruised it dark, and I felt the ice cold grip of death as I touched her belly,over her cream colored dress,she looked so much older than 35. I told her I loved her, and I felt a warm wave of energy from her come to me. That night I had a vision where she told me not to mourn, that she was free now, and the vision showed her resting in Christ's lap, smiling peacefully. She said : " It is so beautiful here, all the broken souls and hearts get to live in this garden here. " The place looked full of light and flowers and laughter. I still dream of Ludwina, not in the way I had the vision. In my dreams she is often in danger, often very vulnerable and small, and I am often helpless to stop her distress. But I always remember the vision, its white bright lights, the sweet music, her peaceful face, resting in Christ's lap, and all the happiness and laughter of other souls around her in a most beautiful garden. I am so glad she showed me that place, and I hope she looks down on me and knows I miss her and love her still. Happy Birthday, Ludwina. Happy Birthday to you.