Life Shorts

My friend -- I want to write about an acquaintance but more than that, a friend who would cause me to stop in passing and ask about children (three like me, all my ages). I have been to her house, eaten her food, and loved our conversations. You know the kind of friend I mean, a dear friend, but ephemeral.

Anyway, she went to sleep Tuesday and didn't wake up.

And that is the kind of thing that throws all kinds of kinks into life.

Not for me, but still... somehow for me. I anguish with her family, imagine their sorrow, their anger, their frustrations, and I ache for their sorrow, their anger, their frustration.

How hard. How incredibly hard. I think about it all day while I clean closets. Which is all I'm good for since I broke the internet.

While I'm not close enough to intrude, to go, to mourn, to hold and hug or sustain, to feed, to succor, I can still pray that her family is being comforted by angels, human or celestial.

Immediate prayer is all I can do. And while I know deep down that this is enough--truly, the power that prayer carries is enough--but while I know that, I still wonder how they are doing.

And deeper than that, what I'm really wondering is how would my family be doing, should this happen to me?

I can only hope that my family knows that I trust God--that I know He knows and loves me and has a plan and my best interests at heart. And with that thought comes the sureity that a prayer offered to Him is enough.

If I have done that, as my friend personified, then a life even so short has been just long enough.