Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Category: Sacred Stories

Contains sacred stories

  • A Timely Visit

    She was sorry to have to say she could not come to sit with her husband’s cousin because she had an appointment the following morning, but during the night she received a message that her appointment had to be rescheduled.

    Seeing that news, she traveled to offer her support. Their cousin was receiving hospice care at home, was not actively conscious, nearing the end of her life.

    While she was there, she recalled how hearing is thought to be the last sense to remain, she read aloud to her the lovely Christmas card which had been received.

    When she noticed no chest rising and falling she called for hospice to come. Their cousin was pronounced dead. May she rest in peace.

    What profound gratitude came with the awareness of the changes outside of her human control that allowed her the privilege of being there that day. That awareness gently spread to other situations in her life which could bring forth concern.

    “The world is held by unseen helping hands….”

    History of Christmas cards*

      Many of the Christmas traditions we celebrate today, like trees and crackers, all started in the Victorian era. The idea of sending Christmas cards become popular after the first commercially produced Christmas card was created by Sir Henry Cole in 1843. Early Christmas cards were expensive to produce.

    May we rest in peace while we still have breath, rather than think we have to wait until we lay down these earth suits.

  • Steel Tongue Drum

    Steel Tongue Drum

    Enjoying time with life-long special music friends as we traveled to our seasonal home in Florida, a dear friend of theirs asked about my not having my SnareCraft drum with me. “It is buried in the van,” I responded, continuing, “I will have it with me the next time we get together. But I do have another new musical toy. It is a six-inch 8-note steel tongue drum.”

    “Oh, my gosh! I have wanted one of those for years!” She excitedly went on, “I heard one in Shipshewana, but you know how it is. My money went to things for the kids.”

    “I have one for you in the van. When I ordered mine I placed the order twice by mistake. I told John I must have gotten one for someone else but I just did not yet know for whom. Now I know. It is for you!”

    The following day, her friend sent a text message: “Oh, it was so good to see you yesterday. I so enjoyed the music and the great conversation. When Patrick picked me up for dinner he said I was gleaming…. like a kid with a new toy…. I have been wanting a drum for so long and I am thrilled with it. Even trying a few easy songs. What a beautiful day…. thank you again.”

    She is pure gift of love and support for our beloved friends. I can imagine their hearts having pushed that “place order button” the second time ordering the drum for her in gratitude for all she does for them. For sure, in the space where all is already known, it was known all along what special person the second steel tongue drum was for.

  • Sunday Hawk Sighting

    They had worked together years ago.

    Their friendship continued for 40 years.

    Every Sunday morning they would talk on the phone.

    Friday, October 25, his friend died.

    On Sunday morning, October 27, as he was driving to the pharmacy to get his medication, the biggest hawk he had ever seen was in the road. That hawk did not move. He had to drive around it. He immediately recognized the sign.

    Hawks are known as the protectors and messengers. His friend loved hawks and had a hawk tattooed on his arm!

  • Better Than Ever

    On Wednesday, October 23, 2024, when she went to the hospital to visit her husband, he said to her, “I am so sorry I missed our anniversary.”

    She told him he had not missed their anniversary, it was coming up on October 31.

    He died on Friday, October 25….

    A couple of days later, as she sorted some paperwork, a sheet fell out: you are better than ever.


    She got a brochure in the mail featuring Backroads 2025 Women’s Adventures.


    She looked at the words on a painted rock: What if… everything you’re going through right now is preparing you for a dream bigger than you can imagine.

    She feels him right there with her guiding, coaching, and encouraging. Both of them better than ever.

  • Cody: Forever Loving

    Cody: Forever Loving

    Checking in with the teachers and his small group while at a meditation retreat, he shared he would be leaving group early to go home for a few hours. A veterinarian was coming to assist their beloved dog, Cody, to freedom from suffering.

    He recorded the group chanting as support for him and his wife and their fur friend and, “All I ask of you is forever to remember me as loving you….”

    He was told how others in this group had been supported by this chant as a loved one died. Several times the person’s passing occurred while a retreat or workshop was happening.

    He found the chant very helpful each time he heard it and once during the chanting he expressed to Cody that he was free and did not have to stay around to support him. He had a clear sense of Cody responding, “I am chanting it to you!”


    From The Dharma of Dogs: Our Best Friends as Spiritual Teachers, by Tami Simon: “The pain of her death was exquisite. I cried for weeks, but felt an incredible joy and comfort that was an equal part of the grief. I was so grateful that I had spent time with her — only with her, fully present and joyful.” (p.163)

    RIP Cody…. Forever loving.

  • Barrel Through It

    He decided to cut his exercise session short at only two sets. While doing that second set, the radio station came in loud and clear, “Ain’t no love in Oklahoma, just the whistle of a long black train….”

    Ain’t No Love In Oklahoma is the theme song for Tulsa King, an American crime comedy-drama television series which stars Sylvester Stallone playing Dwight, a member of the Mafia released from prison in New York and sent to Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he begins to set up a criminal organization. He had recently watched the episode in which Dwight gives an impassioned speech about going forward.

    “You can’t go back once you’ve started this damn journey, you can only go forward. So, you have only got to choices. You get scared and you give up, and then you burn up. And the second one, you say F-it, F-it, F-it…. F-fear. And then you barrel through it. And when you come out on the other side I guarantee you are going to be stronger than you ever thought possible.” ~ Dwight

    That speech had motivated him to burn years of his late wife’s medical records.

    He made the choice to barrel through the rest of his exercise session….

  • Morning Star

    Instead of reading this morning, I decided to just sit by the picture window on the porch and watch the full moon through the trees. As I was watching, I got a reply I was not expecting. The sky lit up with a shooting star that came from east and headed west, and it was very high up. It traveled very slowly and very brightly way out over Chicago. And I took it as a sign, an affirmation.

    I was pondering, could my late wife have been affected by our visit to Ashwaubenon Creek and the Fox River years and years ago? When I showed her the river I think she remembered her grandfather. He is of Native American heritage. Her mother had that dark skin and dark hair and brown eyes.

    The meteorite I saw this morning reminded me of a morning star, Wahbenukqua. Wahbenukqua, which means Morning Star, and her husband, Ashwaubomay, lived on the South side of the Creek.

    There’s quite a story. When a young maiden was kidnapped, he found her. In appreciation, the Chief Standing Earth offered him his choice of two of the prettiest maidens in the village. He chose instead the youngest daughter of the Chief.

    Wahbenukqua and Ashwaubomay were friends with both Indians and Whites alike.

    I take that shooting star to be exactly that — an affirmation.


    Note* Ashwaubomay Park is an 84 acre park that is located at 2881 South Broadway. The land was purchased in 1972 and the park was developed in 1973-74. Ashwaubomay Park is named after “Chief Ashwaubomay” of the Menomonie and Ottawa Nations. The Village name is taken from Ashwaubomay who lived along the river and who is buried along the stream. You can read more about Wahbenukqua and Ashwaubomay at: Village History and Demographics.

  • Dressed by Love

    She was visiting her husband’s mother when a neighbor asked how she was about gently used clothing. A dear friend of the neighbor had died recently. “I have a few things that look like they would fit you,” the neighbor told her.

    They items fit perfectly, as though they were tailor-made for her! She felt such a connection to this woman she had not previously met. “It is like we are soul sisters,” she said.


      ~ Excerpt from “The Clothes of the Dead”, posted on October 13, 2021by Gail Crowther

      I’ve been thinking a lot recently about clothes of the dead. This is partly because I am writing about them, but also generally I’ve been thinking about the status of a dead person’s objects. I’m curious about their value and their meaning….

      Margaret Gibson writes eloquently about the powerful immediacy that clothes can offer us — sometimes containing a trigger of memory, sometimes a record of the past, often returning the dead to the spaces inhabited by the living. She says clothes mobilize our emotions because they are partly how the dead person chose to construct their identity. After their death, we are left with these fragments, which we can piece together to somehow reanimate, resurrect.

      In this sense then, clothes of the dead offer some sort of continuity.

      Three-Martini Afternoons at The Ritz: The Rebellion of Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton (20 April, 2021) by Gail Crowther: Simon & Schuster: New York.

  • Gateway to Freedom

    I have been finding dimes for a friend over a decade now. He had told his wife he would send her dimes from heaven because anyone could send pennies but she was worth more than anyone else. Immediately after I met her, I started finding (and saving) dimes for her.

    Soon after my dear friend died just two months ago, I found a quarter while out riding my bike. It was unusual to find a quarter and as I was picking it up, I heard my friend’s voice in my head say, “Your friend’s husband sends her dimes from heaven but I am going to send you quarters.”

    I found a second quarter. I told my friend’s husband all of this.

    He and I have begun doing a riding ritual as part of the grief journey and he was with me today. He spoke of her loss like a backpack that is weighing him down making it difficult for him to move forward. I suggested he might choose to set the backpack down.

    At that moment, we made a U-turn and I saw a quarter. I stopped to pick it up. Then I noticed there were two quarters! They were lying very near one another. He said, “One for you and one for me.”

    I made some comment about how I save them, and tucked both quarters into my coin purse before we rode on….

    Fishing them out of my coin purse now to put them into my jewelry drawer for safe keeping, I think he is right. I think the 2001 New York State quarter is for him.

    The New York State Quarter features the Statue of Liberty superimposed over an outline of the state along with the inscription “Gateway to Freedom.”

  • A Somatic Visitation

    He woke about 1:00 am feeling her leg slide up against his.

    Her skin felt cool — his warmed beneath the covers.

    His thoughts traveled instantaneously along the line of asking her how she had been able to get into bed without his help. She had navigated severe back challenges.

    She had undergone a major back surgery in hopes of relief from pain and an increase in physical activity. But heart-related issues had preceded the back surgery, and, ultimately, heart-related issues following the back surgery resulted in her choice to stop all medical intervention and embrace comfort care and end-of-life.

    This “somatic visitation” came two months to-the-day of her death.

    Quoting hospice physician Christopher Kerr in the article Common Signs Your Loved One is Visiting You: “Many people have told me that they have been gently touched. A brush against their arm, a hand on the shoulder or their hair being stroked. Some even sense a bed sinking as if someone has sat on it. This is usually comforting, with nearly 99% of people knowing who is trying to communicate.”