A Tribute to Mallory

Last Tuesday evening I was doing creative writing while meditating on Christ when I felt compelled to write the following letter to Chris and Lee Langill, Mallory's parents. I sent it off and told them no response was necessary. But Chris wrote write back to say that they'd been meaning to ask me if I'd write something to be read at Mallory's memorial service back home in Evanston, and whether they could read the letter. I was honored to be asked. Here is the letter that was read.

December 4, 2007
Dear Chris and Lee,

I am sitting in a friend’s second-story flat in Bramcote, Nottinghamshire, England, perched above a park filled with noisy ducks. I’m facing a wall of windows and watching the most beautiful sunset I’ve seen outside of Arizona. I’ve never seen a sunset like this before in Minnesota, Illinois, England or Washington, D.C. The sky is literally aflame with long orange clouds topped by pink, gauzy strips. Shades of deep purple give depth to the brilliant colors. And I am thinking of Mallory.

I didn’t know that Mallory liked the sunset colors until I read your journal today, but it makes perfect sense. I do know she loved pink and orange and purple, because she was always wearing them! When I think back on the last year of Kids Church and my nearly 52 Sundays spent with the same small group in that same room, I always see Mallory as a little bright ball of energy and smiles, even if she was coughing or fighting a fever.

Of course there are no words that will make you feel better or diminish the grief. In fact, I know from experience that, when we Christians are going through deep grief, people will say so many words. Most of them will be well-meant, but even then we will want to scream because we’ve heard the same thing so many times. We get sick of being “preached at” or “cheered up.” We get sick of giving the same dreary explanation and the same assurances of gratitude over and over again. But we do not get sick of knowing someone else cares, that someone else wants to help carry the burdens, if even for a short while.

I just wanted to let you know, then, that I care. I do not know either of you very well and I certainly did not know Mallory as well as many did, but I did know her. And I treasured her. I loved her calm, helpful presence in the midst of a chaotic class, and I also loved that she wasn’t always calm. Despite the fact that she was the “sick kid” (though the other kids never seemed to notice this), she was still human, not saintly. Sometimes she talked too much or didn’t listen, but on the rare occasion when this happened, she was so quick to respond to my gentle chiding. She was not a saint, but she was better than a saint, because she was real yet she loved Jesus and she loved life with her whole heart.

As I told you in an email last summer, Mallory spoke into my life in a dark time, when she shared the complex picture of the servant seeking a precious jewel at great cost, only to see the jewel turn grey and lifeless as he presented it to the King. She wanted to know what it meant, and when I told her to ask God, she did. “I think it means we’re supposed to keep trying, no matter what happens and what the outcome is,” she told me. “God says that what matters is what we do and how we do it, not what we end up with.”

That was a powerful message to me as I contemplated events in my own life, but now I see her picture in a whole new light. God has used this word to speak to me of Mallory’s own life and her own heart. I see Him being tremendously pleased with her, and all that she accomplished for his kingdom, although the ending is so horrendously wrong.

I think of Mallory now and I remember her chattering about her cats, about how Aaron always wanted to play in the hospital play room, about how excited she was to go home and sew a teddy bear with her mom. I remember her bowling me over with big hugs and giggling and giggling and giggling. I remember watching her come into the kids’ room and scanning the crowd for her friends, then her big eyes brightening and that huge smile splitting her face as she ran towards Marissa or Emily. I remember Mallory raising her hand every week to ask us to pray for her and for her loved ones, and I remember her clear, sweet, unbelievably-intelligent-voice reading scripture passages with complete ease.

I recall how last year at Advent the children wrote prophetic Messiah passages onto paper ornaments. It was an activity that was fine and dandy for the older kids, but I knew many of our first graders wouldn’t be able to fit an entire Bible verse onto a Christmas ornament. So I handed the Bible to Mallory and she wrote out the entire verse in careful, perfect, small script more legible than my own. I thanked God yet again for sending Mallory to my class.

I’m glad, right now, that I’m not teaching Sunday School at Evanston Vineyard this year, for I don’t think I could bear being there without having Mallory in the midst.

The sunset is darkening now and the colors are becoming more muted—all but the orange. The orange is flaming out brighter than ever, as if in defiance of the approaching night. The reason I came to my friend’s place this evening is so I could do some creative writing in a peaceful spot, so I was doing some writing about a little dialogue I was having with Jesus. I “saw” him sitting next to me on the sofa and we were chatting about many things, when I suddenly noticed the stunning sky.

“This is one of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen, Jesus!” I exclaimed in my little mind’s eye conversation. I heard his response quite clearly.

“Yes,” he said. “Mallory had a say in it.”

I am so sorry for your loss. There is nothing else to say, but know that Mallory’s death touches so many of us, including me. As I write this, my eyes are filling with tears yet again.

It will be so wonderful to see her again. But I’m going to have to wait in a long line in heaven to get my turn, I think, because no doubt the Lord has already spread her fame far and wide around there, just as he’s done here.

With love,
Stephanie Fosnight

P.S. If you have not already seen it, I do recommend the book “A Sacred Sorrow: Reclaiming the Lost Language of Lament” by Michael Card. It’s at the church bookstore.