From Left: Carrie Kerr (Helen's sister), Shawn Hallmark (Helen's brother) and Helen.
Taken in 1996.

Dear Helen Mae Hallmark:
You were my big sister. I admired you from afar for many years. There are so many things I looked forward to being able to do with you once I grew up, places we could have gone, things we could have seen, and now, nothing. Nothing but a huge void of emptiness filled with anger, loss, and uncertainty, there is no closure. Closure, a word I have heard and used quite frequently these past four years. Will there ever be closure?

I need you so bad right now and wish you were here. The idea of never seeing you again hasn’t completely sunk in for me yet. For the first two years, I still hoped that for some stupid, simple reason you just weren’t calling. Then the third and fourth Christmas’ came and went and reality started to suck. I now sit more than four years after last seeing you with the strong realization that I will not see you again in this place. I do hold on to the hope that when we leave this place our energy continues to live on. I hold on to these thoughts every time I think of you or Grandma. I also hold the picture in my mind of you and her holding each other and looking down on all of us. With this in mind, I can know you are safe and at peace.

Letting go and moving forward, those are generally the final stages of the mourning process. Now this is where I feel this situation becomes so hard for all of us. How are any of us supposed to let go and move forward when we don’t even know what we are dealing with? With so many of you gone, we still are looking at the fact that it’s still happening. Someone is hurting you. So, now I want the so called authorities to find the person or persons responsible for this, make it stop, and then, maybe then, we can find our own closure from this and begin healing.

I have always loved poetry but was never the best at it. Anyway, I have given it a try. I was sitting, thinking of you and the words just came.

I MISS YOU
Days go by so fast, and nothing ever lasts.
I miss you everyday, can’t find the words to say.
I wish that you were here, please take away this fear.
Your soul so big and strong, you didn’t live that long.
I don’t know what’s been done, you been gone for so long.
God hear me as I pray, we find the answers one day.

I love you with all my heart and soul. Your memory shall never fade. You will always be my big sister, and my boys will always feel and know the spirit of their auntie Helen Mae Hallmark Born on June 24, 1966. Daughter, sister, mother, auntie, friend.

Love Forever; Your little sister:

Carrie Lee Ann Kerr


~God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference, Amen.~