Life is fragile…

This morning I opened a WhatsApp message. It came last night as a response to my reply to her initial message, asking how I was.

Her husband, also a friend, has been diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease. I was shocked to the core. I’ve known him since he was 14 or younger. He is just a bit younger than me. His brother was my best friend for years.

I responded with all the love I have for them.

Life is not to be taken for granted. Especially our health, family, and friends. Money doesn’t buy happiness. Gratitude does. When we live with gratitude for what we have, the beauty around us, wonderful aromas, the songs of birds, trees, real vanilla ice-cream, the breeze on our face, the warmth of the sun, the wonder of the moon, Venus, the first star of the evening, we can know happiness.

With things as they are with the pandemic, and the regulations here, and when they are lifted it still will be risky to be in crowded places and to travel, I can’t go for a brief visit. When things are safer, I so want to see them. I saw her for coffee in my garden at the end of last summer. Then, he thought he had an injury. Now, one leg is affected, and he gets spasms and cramps. That’s how fast it has progressed. His prognosis is two and a half years.

His wife, my closer friend, and younger, will be a widow at 50.

I know people lose their spouses and partners at any age, but when it’s so close to me it seems young to be a widow.

So he has never smoked, got drunk, or lazed around. No, he just got a most cruel disease.

That’s not to say smoking and alcohol don’t do harm. They do harm suddenly. Heart attacks, strokes, emphysema, etc.

I keep wanting to post poems, but I can’t right now. I feel tired, although I actually slept until 8 this morning. I felt feverish earlier but that’s gone.

Please click like, I know you read. Only a few do now. I’m grateful for them. I welcome comments too.