The other day, I woke up with a tingle in my skin. I wasn’t real sure why, but it just felt funny. I blamed it on the vertigo.
On the way to work it was raining. Big drops falling from the sky, high wiper weather at times.
With every drop that hit the windshield, I could feel the prickles on my skin.
My nerve endings were on fire. So close to the surface, the slightest movement tingled.
The radio was on the news talk channel.
War this.
Economy that.
Hate here.
Unemployment there.
A high school boy collapses at school and dies a few days later.
A middle school boy collapses and is in critical condition.
Mothers lose sons. Fathers lose their pride and joys. They pick out caskets instead of cleats and pads or birthday presents They sit at bedsides willing their child to wake up.
Cousins and friends and neighbors grieve. Grandparents wonder why it wasn’t them. They would surely trade places in an instant.
Families are forever changed. All that’s left are memories, an empty seat at the table, and a giant hole in the hearts of so many.
Tears filled my eyes and burned as they fell down my cheeks. I turned the station.
All day, my skin tingled.
Late in the day, a Facebook post from my high school said that a girl I went to school with had died.
My heart fluttered and ached. My own realization that tomorrow is not promised was underlined.
Too much loss.
It’s just too much some days.
Some days grief is like nerve endings that feel every whisper of a breeze and every single touch. The contact can be feather-soft, but the lingering sensation it leaves feels endless.
I want to scream for it all to stop. For children to stop being taken from parents. For people not to suffer.
But that’s not the way it works. We’re not promised tomorrow. We’re not even promised five minutes from now. Nobody even promised that our children are ours to keep.
That’s not fair.
For now, I choose to live life out loud. I may not go skydiving or climb Mt. Everest, but I will try my best to live like tomorrow may never come.
I want my days to count.
How will you make every day count?
this is why I adore you!
Aww, thanks. I adore you, too! Lunch soon, I hope!
I have been devastated lately. It sounds stupid, but my computer crashed two weeks ago taking 13 years of photos and videos and all my writing. No backup.
I know in the larger scheme this means nothing, but in some way it has been a little death.
All the photos of people I’ve loved who are now gone are also gone.
Everything is temporary.
Everything is borrowed.
Nothing is stable.
Like ants after that rain, we just have to rebuild. What else can we do?
OH, that makes my heart hurt for you
I’m so sorry. In the large scheme, you’re right, it’s small, but it’s a big deal and a big heartache. Everything IS temporary. Sending you love ((hugs))
This is amazing, Jana. I completely get it and agree. Your writing here is so eloquent!!
Most of the time I’m able to embrace life and LIVE it but sometimes the fear of that impending moment – that moment when you know something is crumbling in your hands – gets to me. I wish I could stop anticipating the losses!
Ewokmama recently posted..Just A Fever
I’ll try to make every day count by allowing your words and the words of all that grieve over the loss of a loved one, a child in particular, to echo through my mind…especially on those days when I become indifferent to life or begin to take my loved ones for granted. Thank you, Jana.
Sandra recently posted..Fall Is Upon Us
I like to keep this link available to pull me back from some of the “miseries of the world” days. I, too, will never understand why children are taken from their parents & grandparents & families……..that was quite eloquent Daughter. Love from me to you………..http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXvJ8UquYoo. Pay attention to the words, faces, colors, etc. (I usually watch it a minimum of 3 times when I go to it!)
Oh, Jana, how I wish there were some certainty about what tomorrow will bring. However, you’re right: tomorrow may never come. It makes me glad I have such beautiful people to share my today with. I love you hard!
Cindy recently posted..Petri dishes
A few years ago, I was looking on facebook for some former classmates I used to go to school with, and stumbled upon a memorial page for one classmate I had. He had apparently died a few years before, in 2006. Car crash.
I found that absolutely shocking. Never mind the fact that he had been dead for more than a year without my even knowing it… So I feel for you on that.
As far as all the bad news in the media, I’m inclined to believe that part of that is due to the fact that the news is usually more inclined to read the bad stuff, and not necessarily because that’s the only news that happens in the world. Good stuff happens too, it just doesn’t get reported.
My mum doesn’t even watch the news because of how negative it is, what with her being the eternal optimist and all… It caused her to miss the news of 9/11 when it happened, even.
Although, I suppose there’s also the fact that terrible things are happening the world today too… America’s gay suicides, the recent Muslim riots, the wars in the Middle East…
littlewonder2 recently posted..Six Sentence Sunday – China
The news is SO hard. I don’t listen to a lot of it because it makes my heartache. Bad news is almost guaranteed when you turn on the television. Hearing that someone our own age has passed away is shattering isn’t it?
Kenya G. Johnson recently posted..Tug of Heart…