We went to the viewing this evening.  Or wake, as my family still calls it.  Must be some lingering cultural holdover from the one Irish ancestor I had.

My friend seems to be holding up well – but I don’t know how much of that is a valiant façade.  She’s incredibly strong; rarely have I ever seen her nonplussed.  But I know the depth of feeling that lies under that composed face.  She told us she was all cried out, and that she was trying to look at the positive aspects of their life, his life.

He’d died quickly, doing what he loved, having a blast with people whose company he thoroughly enjoyed, having just achieved a long-anticipated personal goal within minutes before he died.  Even as young as he was, he’d known his wife for 29 years, had been happily married his entire adult life to his high school sweetheart.

It sure sounds wonderfully storybook.

Right up until this chapter.

My husband is pretty down about it right now.  He’s been able to compartmentalize it over the last couple of days, with work taking up all his psychic wattage until this evening.  Then he had to confront it all over again: the funeral home, the mass of mourners, the massive bouquets.  Like having to revisit his brother’s death all over again.

The funeral is tomorrow.  It will be harder.

We’ll have yet another funeral on Monday as well; it should be much easier, the passing of a beloved elderly uncle who’d lived a long and happy life, whose death was not expectedly immediately and yet was no surprise because of mounting age-related health problems.

This is how it should be, we hope.  But having experienced two such early passings already, I now know the long and happy life may be much more of a model to which we aspire than truth.

10:06:26 PM    comment []

Damn.  We can't catch a break.  Not at all.

My mother-in-law's oldest brother just died.  One of her sister-in-laws has been hospitalized over the past weekend, to boot.

Blogging will be spotty for the next two days.  .

Spend time with your family and older relations, okay?

12:57:44 PM    comment []

This week has sucked the air right out of me.  I feel like I can’t breathe, crushed by the loss of a friend and disillusionment.

Remember the “Giving Tree” project?  We’ve gotten a few more alternatives after re-approaching the organizing charitable group.  Clothes, toys for the boy, coveralls for the father, and a DVD-VHS combo player for the mother.

Imagine my thoughts here.

Anyhow, I’m making a conscious effort to breathe deeply.  I’m going to get outside, take a leisurely stroll, clear my head, try to do some constructive, big picture stuff.

And maybe a bunch of little stuff, too.  Like laundry…baking Christmas cookies…and this blog post.

10:27:23 AM    comment []