Haze

A good friend of our family was in a horrible accident early last week and passed away on Saturday. It was all so very unexpected. He was strong and healthy and so close to retirement. I realized that I can't remember much of last week. I sort of went through the time in a haze, unable to really process what was going on around me. It was one of those, "But I just talked to him last week. I was about to send him pictures of my race since he asked me to. We were going to visit this fall."

One thing I learned that I don't think I would have agreed with before last week is that I prefer awful news via text message. That seems cold and impersonal, doesn't it? But receiving all news this way made it so I could have my little break down, process my thoughts and emotions, and THEN call to get full details without my crying becoming a major part of the conversation. After all my grief is real, but I am hardly the main character in such a situation.

A strange lesson to glean from such tragedy. It went hand in hand with the reminder we each get from sudden death: Life is precious and fleeting and should not be wasted.

I think I'm still in a bit of a haze. My apologies if I stared blankly at any of you this week. Or was grouchy. I was definitely grouchy with my seminary students....but they're surly and sitting in my living room at 6 a.m., so I tend to be grouchy at them anyway.

Life.