Love, Loss and Understanding
It is a lesson I have learned many times. It is one I am certain I will have to endure again. I hate it at the same time I have accepted it is a part of the cycle of Life.
This May 9th marks the fifth year I lost my older brother to cancer. The loss was damned tough for so many reasons, as can be imagined, not the least of which was his daughter’s 6th birthday was a few days before, the impact on his wife; the worst for me was seeing how it affected my parents. Mother’s Day was just four days after his passing.
I’ve written all of these things here before, I know. It is important to know that we should all love those to beyond the limits of our capacity, to enjoy every minute of them in our lives because the only time, it seems, we truly understand the depths of that love is when they are gone.
I do not know why this ‘simple’ thing is a hard lesson to be relearned at every passing. Is it because the thought of losing whomever is too painful to contemplate? Possibly. But how much worse to never again get the chance to say….anything, everything, so many things again?
It tends to be a rough emotional time this time of year, though that acute sense of sadness has greatly diminished and has been replaced with, admittedly, bittersweet memories of the good man that he was. But I am much more quick to both cry or get angry for a few weeks around this time.
As we can, we get together with his wife and daughter and remember him, especially around this time, of course, but also celebrating his daughter’s birthday is such a perfect way to also celebrate him.
Be well. Take some extra time to tell those you love that you do love them.