What a difference a day can make to change the rest of your life. As the saying goes, make every day count because it could be your last. While sage advice no one really likes to think each day has the possibly of being their last. Did you ever see the Simpsons where Homer took a course in being successful and that phrase was one of the rules… He sat in a parking lot and cried about how he didn’t want to die.
We go through spurts of time making sure everyone we know is aware that we are fortunate for their presence in our existence. It’s usually during times of great stress or tragedy that we make this effort. It would be nice to tell them everyday, but I think the gushing would loose it’s impact and sincerity.
The last few weeks have been a wave of change for those around me and when I list it out, it’s shocking. Not shocking that these things could happen, but in the actual time frame in which they occurred…the last two to three weeks. First a good friend was in a car that is hit by a semi truck, luckily no one was hurt, but a SEMI!!!! Second, another dear friends looses a close family relative suddenly, then another’s house caught fire which rendered her homeless for a brief period of time and then the news of another dear friend who’s family lost a young girl. And young people passing always shocks me, leaves me a little stoned for a few days because even though what and who we are as humans is part of some great plan that we have yet to understand, young death seems to get lost in that idea. It doesn’t make sense to me.
Finally, my mother. My mother is only 58 years old fell and broke her hip earlier this week. Having your parents injured, incapacitated brings on a whole new other fear…Life without them there. Fortunately.. well depending on the day you ask about them, just kidding. kinda. Both of my parents are alive and mostly well. The thought of loosing either one of them leave me numb even though the day will eventually come.
Over the course of the next few months, my mother will be in my charge until she mends and is able to take care of herself again. This is stressful, not because I don’t want to do it, but any time a huge wrench is thrown into your life, the adjustments and responsibilities are immense and exhausting. Taking care of her personal items, making sure her insurance is in order and that her short-term disability is in check, making sure her house is taken care of, fridge cleaned out, dishes done, cat moved in with me, has been surreal. I know she hates being helpless, I know she doesn’t want me to take care of her. I know the next few months will be physically and emotionally tough for her, but I sit here and look at why this happened. Not in the sense of “oh why oh why do bad things happen to good people”, but in the sense that maybe our relationship needed something that I needed to take care of her and this was the vehicle that the universe threw at us. Maybe she needed an awakening of some sort or maybe I did.
Everything can change in one day. How often we forget.
1 Comment
July 25, 2008 at 4:40 pm
Word.
Let me know if there is anything we can do. Maybe we could take M to the park or something.