Remembrance lantern lights lift spirits
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
Megan Strickland
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RONAN – The lights twinkled brightly and floated peacefully toward the heavens, until disappearing in the a quiet cold Ronan night sky, bearing messages to loved ones who remain only in the memories and spirits of those who loved them.
Ronan Student Council sent nearly 100 floating remembrance lanterns into the night sky last week, as way to honor those who won’t be gathered around the Christmas tree this year.
Andrew Koehler doesn’t have too many Christmas memories of his grandmother Joan Hitchings, but he still lit a lantern in her honor at the ceremony.
“I just remember going to Illinois at Christmastime and they would have a train,” Koehler said.
Dr. Marie May sent a message to her sister Molly.
“I just remember her immense joy on Christmas morning at my house,” May said. “It was (as) if she was free from her disability.”
Notes to loved ones included messages of “I love you,” “I miss you,” while others were simply names scrawled, sometimes with drawings, each with a unique story of a life completed.
Some people saw the lights from the highway and stopped in to take part in heartfelt ceremony. Student Council Adviser Bonnie Eva said the event has grown each of the three years that the school has hosted it.
“I think people who are hearing more about it are coming to draw and light on their own and send them off themselves,” Eva said. “We’re still having people come in off the highway and I love that because that means that people have noticed them and that is what they are really meant to do: have someone notice them.”
Eva said people have told her that the ceremony is comforting to have during the holiday season.
“It makes them feel like it’s Christmas,” Eva said. “It helps them get into the Christmas spirit and make the holidays still feel like the holidays. It’s not so commercialized.”
