Mary Hill

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I first met Mary Hill in 2009 at a writing workshop called, “Writing Your Life“. It was August 9th, Mary’s birthday, and she treated herself to learn something new. Mary was late to the workshop, so she didn’t end up in my sketch that day. After the workshop, we talked in the hallway for some time. She had studied healing and psychology in California. She returned to Orlando to take care of her mother who was bed ridden with fibrosis and other aliments.  Mary ultimately gave up five years of her life to take care of her mother. I visited the Hill house and sketched Margaret Hill. At the time my own step-mom had cancer and she had to be put in a retirement home. I respected Mary for the care she gave to her mom. I returned to the Hill residence multiple times, feeling privileged to get to know both Mary and her mom.

On one visit, Margaret’s breathing grew shallow and panicked. She was moved to her bed where Mary placed her hand above her mother’s chest and prayed. She would take the negative energy and then exhale it into the corner of the room. Within minutes Margaret was fine and she fell fast asleep.  This was a spiritual form of heeling I had never seen before. If I hadn’t seen it first hand, I wouldn’t have believed it. Mary felt something flow through her when she did this and she knew it was god’s healing touch that she helped manifest. Mary probably had the most faith of anyone I have ever met. At times she expressed feeling closer to god in her prayers and meditation than she did in the harsh grind of everyday existence. Angels often appeared in the art created by Mary.

We decided to collaborate on a project called “LifeSketch.” Mary would interview residents of a retirement home while I sketched. Interviewing people in their golden years was incredibly rewarding since stories and lessons learned over a lifetime often seemed to profoundly reflect what what was happening today. Mary had a natural way of getting people to open up to her which resulted in very enlightening interviews. Mary would condense the interview into one page of precise heart felt copy. That article would then be matted and framed beside my sketch and presented to client. Often multiple copies would be made for children and grand children.

When her mom died, Mary comforted everyone else at the funeral.  It was only after her mothers ashes in a cylinder were lowered into a shallow hole at Woodlawn, that Mary’s knees gave way, and grief enveloped her. She always wanted to care for others and after her mother’s death she got a state license and opened her own healing massage office. I was sure that through word of mouth, that business would grow and thrive.

Mary always knew how to make me laugh. She also knew how to listen and accept tears. I grew up in a Methodist family that hid all emotion, so it was surprising to see how she left nothing checked when she experienced the lows and highs of grief and humor. I felt that openly expressing sorrow was a sign of weakness, but she let the full spectrum of emotion wash over her.

I remember talking to her shortly after she broke up with her boyfriend, Berto Ortega. The relationship was on and off. Though separated, they still talked often. She said that she could go anywhere and do anything now that she was completely on her own.  I had assumed she would travel to an exotic country to do missionary work after her mom died.

Berto was a talented plein air painter. After they broke up, he took a trip in his truck to the Grand Tetons where he did several paintings and then shot himself. He left quite a few suicide notes for friends and clients but he didn’t leave a note for Mary. Only now can I begin to imagine the sense of grief and guilt she must have felt.

As I was sketching in Berto’s studio at FAVO, Mary came in with several paintings that Berto had left with her. She leaned over and read with some interest a suicide note full of thanks and appreciation Berto had left with Will Benton. Mary hugged me and I asked her, “Are you OK?” She replied quite simply, “No, Pray for Berto’s relatives and pray for me.” That was the last thing she said to me. She left the studio and was gone.

The Memory Room

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It was back in August of 2009 when I first met Mary Hill and later, her mother Margaret Hill. Mary moved from California to take care of her mom here in Orlando. For five years she was responsible for her mother’s care. Margret’s pulmonary fibrosis and other conditions grew worse until she couldn’t get out of bed. It was around this time that I did several sketches of Margaret and interviewed her about her life. She died on December 28th of 2011.

It was a bit strange returning to Margaret’s old bedroom. The room seemed immense and empty. An old Teddy Bear sat on top of some shelves. This was won at a state fair by Duane Hill, her future husband, and it was the first present he ever gave her. In a box tied with twine and labeled “Junk”, were all the letters Duane and Margaret wrote each other when they were dating. A photo of Mary’s parents was on the wall behind her along with paintings of the Virgin Mary and Jesus. This was always a religious family. Mary’s aunt was a nun.

Mary was busy trying to sort all the family photos into cardboard bins. She was trying to decide which relatives should get which photos. It seems that Margaret took more photos of grandchildren than she did of her own children. Each of Mary’s brothers had a shelf where their stiff collared High School photos were stored. So much of the family’s true story remained hidden from the staged and posed family photos. Yet each snapshot could bring back a flood of memories, clear reminders of what truly happened.

The Chaplain Visits

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On a return visit to Margaret Hill, she was able to get up with much help and eat at the dining room table. I joined her and Mary for lunch. Mary grew concerned watching her mothers breathing worsen over the course of lunch. She helped her mother get back into bed. Margaret’s breathing grew shallow and harsh. She began to struggle for each breath and began to panic. Mary placed her left hand on her mother’s brow and then held her right hand over her mothers chest. She made a gesture like she was crumpling a sheet of paper and then she threw it away. Mary did this several times, breathed in deeply and then turned her head away and exhaled into the corner of the room. It appeared as though Mary was in a very deep meditative state. Instantly Margaret calmed down and her struggle to breath lessened. In a matter of perhaps 15 minutes she fell fast asleep. I had never seen anything like this. I was mystified. Mary is a Christian and has absolute faith in the healing powers of God working through her as his instrument. Mary also has a Master’s degree in spiritual psychology, participates in various healing/creative art ministries and studied various healing tradition in California, before returning to care for her mother.

Although I am still baffled by what I saw, from my perspective, it seems to me that Mary is able to deflect diseased energy, then channel a very intense healing energy where it then flows to the person she is in prayer for. There was an overwhelming calm and peace in her mother’s room.

As her mother slept, a chaplain and hospice nurse arrived. The chaplain comes to the house frequently to address Margaret’s emotional and spiritual needs. Mary talked to the chaplain for some time discussing her mother’s physical and emotional states. Copious notes were taken as the mother and daughter’s needs were evaluated. In the kitchen, where Mary and the Chaplain are talking, there is a photo of Margaret in her prime on the wall. It’s as if she is looking over the Chaplain’s shoulder, perhaps to observe and grace these emotionally charged and sometimes heart-wrenching discussions.

On a trip to a doctors office Mary recited a poem she was inspired to write about healing, how it flows through her and how God has used others to heal her as well. She agreed to share it, with gratitude and blessings.

A Place to Meet

Meet me…in the stillness of my touch

Allow me to feel your pain, it won’t hurt quite as much.

Meet me…in the safety of my soul

Tell me your stories, the ones you’ve dared, but never told.

Meet me…in the solitude of my heart

Lay down your sorrow, welcome healing’s start.

Meet me…in the center of the earth

Surrender to its wisdom, awaken to your rebirth

Meet me…far beyond the ageless universe

Bask in love’s perfection; nothing’s better, nothing’s worse.

Meet me when you’re willing, meet me when you can

It’s there I’ll give my best to you – my mind, my heart, my hands.

-Mary J. Hill 2005

Margret Sleeps

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Mary Hill has been caring for her ailing mother for the last five years. Her mother has pulmonary fibrosis, among many other problems. Margaret Hill is at home, bedridden and under the constant care of her daughter along with private duty help. Recently, she is also under the medical direction of a local Hospice. I met Mary at a writing workshop and it was with a refreshing openness, curiosity and acceptance of the beauty of this thing we call life and death that Mary told me about her mother. I expressed an interest and love of sketching people in diverse scenarios. It was then with a tremendous leap of faith and generosity that Mary invited me to her mother’s home to meet and sketch her Mom. When I was introduced to Margaret, she clutched my hand with a surprisingly firm grip the whole time we talked. A CD was playing soothing Christian music by Ruth Fazal and when we weren’t talking Margaret would close her eyes and hum to the songs. She falls asleep every night to this same music and at her request listens to these same songs many times a day. “They are my favorites,” she shares with a smile. I asked her if I could sketch and she gladly agreed. A rocking chair, and a great source of pride, as it is the same rocking chair that Margaret had rocked all 5 of her children and many grandchildren to sleep in, sat at the foot of her bed. I sat down in the seat of honor and quietly blocked in the scene and before long Margaret was fast asleep. Mary felt my presence and attention had a soothing affect on Margaret. Mary left the room to afford me quiet, focused time to sketch. Her mother breathed evenly with fresh oxygen being supplied by a noisy oxygen concentrator that was down the hallway in the living room. The machine made a constant sound much like a scuba diving apparatus.

From where I sat at the foot of the bed, I could see Mary down the hall at the kitchen table writing in her journal. I thought she might be curious about my drawing so once I had the features of Margaret’s face set down in ink, I got up and quietly walked down the hall to show her. I tapped her on the shoulder and showed her the early stages of the drawing. She was moved to tears at the startling reality and solemn beauty of her mother. She said I had captured the essence and expression of her mother right down to the slight worry lines that often furrow her brow. I had never had someone cry when they saw my work before. I felt I was doing something important by documenting this fleeting moment. When I returned to work I proceeded with quiet deliberateness. Drawing and listening to Margaret’s breath left me with a sense of peace and a certainty that this was an important drawing.