The Beginnings of Endings

 Yesterday I learned that my good, close, cyber friend, Kathy, is in hospice. Her bone cancer spread to the brain. She's despondent, refuses visitors, and has turned off her phone. 

We 'talked' every day, over email. A big hole in my life when she's gone (because it's all about me, of course). She loved my dark humor; hers was the same.

I'm in touch with her husband, who has his own issues, a back thrown out from lifting her after one of her falls. He's basically alone, can't drive, so can't visit.

They're in Texas, or I would drive out to help. Wave from the parking lot to her, like a crazy person. Which she knows I am.

How much time? I thought she had more. 

I also packed up my Mom's stuff out of the files, into a box to store. It's been almost a year since she died. Our relationship was difficult, for reasons only she knows, or knew.

Anyway, why do good people die, when evil ones still walk the Earth?

Without Kathy to type to everyday, I may be posting more on this Blog.

Friends, furries, and Discontent, musing on death

 It's snowing, in April. Welcome to Western PA.

I'm ruminating on sad events. They tell you not to do that, but, it's my blog and I can do what I want. (tongue in cheek)

One day I came home from school and my dog was gone. my mom took him back to the pet shop, my brother was allergic. No build up, no explanation, just gone from my life. I was ten. How does a child process that?

My horse drowned, decades ago. My best friend and I tied him up  too close with my brother's horse, the leads got tangled. My horse fell. The rain poured down. He drowned in the swell of the creek.

I had the flue. All the ugly events came together for disaster. When I asked my brother to check on him, it was too late.

My heart broke. Comanche was young, too young to die. I was twelve.

A dapple gray, close to my horse.

Life is full of devastating losses. My brother gone when I was 24, my only sibling. My parents would never talk of it. How do you recover from that? You march on, as they say.

* * *

My good friend is suffering through cancer. She had breast cancer 15 years ago. It returned as bonce cancer. 

She's afraid to die. I'm terrified to lose her. Today she gets the news that will tell how bad it has gotten. I want to be there, even in Covid, but she's 3,000 miles away on the west coast. 

She got the news, the cancer has spread. The docs will do a more aggressive chemo on her, shunt on all. She might have a year. Why do evil people skate through life and good ones get death sentences?

Another good friend has a husband dying of a rare cancer. She's in England. We've been pen-pal critique buddies since 2006. We finally met up two years ago in London. She was all I'd imagined her to be. I hope I passed muster. I can't find the pic of us together. Her husband has about a year.

I don't want to lose any of these women, one through disease, the other through grief. But we must stay strong, march on, gird our loins, grit our teeth. I plan to visit her in a couple of years, when Covid fades away. 

Even when pieces are chipped away throughout leaving us like Swiss cheese, Americans are supposed to pretend to be happy, but I think we are all different. I'm grateful for what I have but grieve over my losses, or losses to come.

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