10/08/2018
Life IS fragile. DO all you can to live a life you can love. Be grateful for it. Job is a book of poetry in the bible where Job loses his family. Kids and their spouses. Never on earth, again did I think I’d hear of such a thing. For all who have lost so much and, with pain so unimaginable to carry on....wow. I can’t wrap my mind around.
The news is something you see from a far away land, not here. And if it is here, it’s not close, not down the road.
How can 20 people die in a car accident?
It doesn’t make sense.
My Facebook feed is filled with people that knew individuals that died Saturday in the most horrific way imaginable. There’s a million people locally, but it’s still a tight knit community.
There’s not a lot to say. How many lives were changed in an unimaginable way? At least hundreds. Is it too much to say thousands?
I dont think so. We all have such an incredible reach. Imagine 20 of us combined just disappearing in an instant.
How many kids no longer have parents? We don’t yet know, except for the fact that all of the victims seem to be in their late 20’s and 30’s.
One was a teacher. Four of them were sisters. All of their husbands as well. Two pedestrians likely just walking to their car.
Where were they going? How did it happen?
And then the hardest question of all...
Why did it happen?
Why do we live in a world where 18 friends pile into a limo to celebrate a 30th birthday and end up dead in a ditch.
Why? Why is that even possible?
I don’t know. I wish I did.
There’s no place for sympathy. There isn’t an “at least....” moment here. We can send kind thoughts and prayers. We can send money to GoFundMe’s for children and funeral expenses. We can send cards and flowers.
These are all good and right things to do.
But it doesn’t answer the why. And all the people that must wrestle with that, my heart aches for them. Somewhere today there is a person alive that lost all their friends this weekend.
You can light a candle if you like. And pray for sure. Money helps. So does talking.
But you really should do one thing today to honor all the people whose lives were taken so suddenly.
You should live. Today. Do it. Get up and live.
That’s how you really honor the dead. Honor them with the action of never taking a moment for granted.
Need that vacation? Don’t countdown the days. Tomorrow is not guaranteed, let alone months from now.
Waiting for retirement and your new life? Don’t count the days. Sometimes they don’t come.
Want to eat that second helping of dessert? You do it. And say mmmm the whole time.
Haven’t gone for a walk or run in a while? Find the time to do it. Today. Clear your head. Quiet your mind.
Love that person? Scared of the rejection? Scared of the what if? Own it. Lean into it. Hold their hand. Tell them.
Because tomorrow may never come.
(The photo was taken by Lori Van Buren of the Times Union. It captures painfully what I’m sure so many people are feeling today.)
