Topic: Life
Well, it's the day after I found out about my Aunt's death and though I am not exactly 100% yet, I do feel a little better.
I have the blessings of having a wonderful partner, son, and very caring friends. To Scotty and Caitlin, thank you.
When Ken got off from work last night he was sweet enough to bring home a sack full of "comfort food". I guess everyone has their guilty pleasure. For some its ice cream, others cake, for me... well it's chicken mcnuggets.
Today has been an odd day for me. Not good, not bad, just sort of full of contemplative thoughts that are jumbling around in my brain. I guess, I'm just trying to make sense of it all, if there is any. Let me see if I can explain...
You see, before my Aunt passed away, I had been trying to balance the scale on a separate though similar situation and dealing with it the way I always seem to deal with things; silently, in my heart and head, but not so much out in the open.
About a year ago, more or less, a former friend of mine had been diagnosed with treatable Lung Cancer. She was considered very lucky at the time because it was discovered early. However, and I don't know the medical technicalities although I do know it is rare, the cancer moved to her brain and formed a tumor. She wasn't given a good prognosis. Surgery was scheduled, but the chance of success is minimal. As I am writing this she is lying in a hospital with a 50/50 chance of surviving. She is a few years younger than I am and has four children.
I have had mixed feelings about it. Don't get me wrong, I believe it to be a sad and terrible situation and my heart goes out to her, her present husband and her children, two of which used to be playmates of my son. Though our friendship ended on rocky terms, I have never and still don't wish her ill will. My confusion has been more about how involved I should be in all of it and now with the death of my Aunt it just seems to be magnified.
I won't go into specifics, as it was many many years ago and the history isn't relevant anymore. Save to say we had a disagreement about something, in retrospect, that was very insignificant but at the time seemed an important drama. Neither one of us ever picked up the phone to talk to the other about it. Two or three years passed, and her mother (whom I was also close to) died. I went to the funeral to pay my respects to the family, she and I talked, dealt with it briefly in a kind of "I'm okay, you're okay" way and tried to be friends. But it just didn't work. She and I were just too different and after the years that we hadn't communicated we seemed even more so. We just quietly and without anger went our separate ways.
It was difficult, as her husband was a good friend of mine but there was no sense in she and I pretending that the friendship was still there.
So fast forward a bit. She and her husband divorced and she remarried a person that was in mine and Ken's former group of friends. Her husband and I caught up with each other and I, whether I liked it or not, got first hand information about how ugly the aftermath of the divorce had gotten. Always aware that the truth is somewhere in the middle, I avoided taking any sides. However, I would be lying if I said that what I was hearing left anything but a poor impression of my former friend. It's strange how no matter how far apart you make yourself from the people in your past, you still find yourself in the circle of information nonetheless.
Okay, so now that I have blathered on, my only real problem (if it can really be called that) I had with my former friend (and her sisters) involves her mother, whom I also considered a friend. Every Memorial Day, I visit her mother's grave to place yellow roses (her favorite), clean her plaque, and talk to her. I'm the only one who visits her grave. The reason I know this, is from talking to the caretaker after the bronze vase from her plaque disappeared.
Now, I'm not angry at her or her two sisters for not visiting their mother's grave. Without going into details, I know all too well the history there and they have more than anyone a right to their choices. I guess, I had hoped the years of getting older and being a mother herself and knowing just how hard that can be sometimes would have softened her more. I don't hold it against her or her sisters, however.
So, getting away from the tangent and getting back to my confusion over the situation. I guess I've felt that going to her now, given that we aren't friends anymore, would be hypocritical and more than a little unfair to her. I had no inclination to get in touch with her and renew our friendship before any of this happened, so to do so now just seems disingenuous. I do care, very much. It would be impossible, given our history, not to. Perhaps that's why there is always that little voice of doubt in my head that asks "Are you doing the right thing?".
Something I have learned the hard way is that second thoughts are too late in coming when someone dies.
Either way, given recent events, I don't think I'm in any frame of mind to make any right decisions. Everything is still too fresh and no less complex in my mind. I just hope clarity returns soon, these chaotic thoughts are just too much right now.
I just hope that her surgery was a success and that she can recover completely and return to her husband and children. May the Gods and Goddesses give them all strength.
Brightest blessings.
Posted by spiritiger
at 4:08 PM
Updated: Tuesday, 27 October 2009 5:26 PM
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Updated: Tuesday, 27 October 2009 5:26 PM
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