After a really sweet nice Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with family from England and all his children, my sister's brother-in-law woke up early in the morning and shot himself in the head.
Of course there are always reasons and I'm sure he felt everyone would be better off, but did he know how far the ripples would go from his actions. No.
My mom had a patch of cancer cut out of her arm. The diagnosis looks good. Do I run to Utah now or wait till we can get together with more family and the price of tickets is good?
Attending a planning meeting today, I observed my good friend and shoved the tears down low so we could have a successful meeting. Of course now that I'm alone I can let them drop off my face. Lisa has always been musically talented and given so much to the elementary school classes and musicals, choirs in church, roadshows, talent shows, ensembles at the high school, weddings, and everybody else who needed a helping hand in music. The 'cure' for her breast cancer had a side effect with radition and nerve damage makes her right arm and hand hang limply like a stuffed sock. She puts a pencil in her hand to write sidewise like a crab and raises her right arm with her left to sustain members at church. No more directing choirs, accompaning friends, and wrapping her arm around her girls.
Yeah I know she is very thankful to be alive, working, and planning and happy to be with her family and sings so nicely and would absouletly hate any pity. I'm still sad.
Jumping on the blogs tonight my friend Jennifer posted some surprizing news - number one their first child is due in July/August, number two she was writing from Salt Lake City instead of Idaho because when they were called in to the doctors office for results to a check up the doctor wanted them to jump on a plane to Utah because their hospital couldn't take care of her husband (of one year) and they needed to go to Salt Lake City where they were met by an ambulance and he's been offically diagnosed with CML - Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia and needs to have another round of some drug that starts with an A. This is a boy (OK man) who's father died 6 months before he got married last year from cancer he fought valiantly for years. Jennifer's dad died of cancer when she was 7. Of course her blog was full of hope, love and optimism too.
I'm crying for her mom Stephanie, I was there when her dad died. He was our home teacher. I'm just really down and the salt is making my face itchy and my kleenex needs to be thrown away.
So my thanks are selfish. I'm glad I don't have cancer, nobody in my family has died (yet), and everyone is in school, on a mission, or doing just fine. We have money in the bank, a nice home and
I just can't stop crying for my friends.
