Requiem

There are a lot of posts that I go back and forth on. Sometimes it's because I don't know if what I am going to talk about is interesting enough. Sometimes it's because some topics are too personal for the internet. Sometimes it's because the situation isn't really mine and I don't know whether it's right for me to be doing any talking.

Today I find myself in the same position. I've spent most of the last day trying to decide whether this post would be about my difficulties sizing the fish mittens (not pattern related difficulties, just personal decision and ripping related difficulties) or about a sad family event going on right now around me. In the end, I've opted for the family event, because I really haven't been able to focuse that much on thinking too hard about knitting.

You see, on Wednesday evening, just as John and I were about to sit down at a our date night restaurant table, John got a call from his mother. His father had passed away suddenly during the afternoon. In an instant, what had been a nice day that was going to be capped with a nice dinner, changed completely. We left without sitting down. Since that time, John has been dealing with the realities of his father's passage.

I'm not going to say too much about John's dad. Like all people, he was a complex, multi-faceted individual, and because my Polish is limited to food vocabulary and his English was not very deep either, I knew him in a very shallow way. He was deeply religious, missed farming, and loved his grandchildren. He always took the time to ask after my family when I was over to visit. When he could, he liked to raise bunnies and tend to his summer garden. We were glad that John had talked to him just yesterday and and that he had recently had a chance to go back to Poland and that we'd shared some nice Christmas holidays together.

But this really got me thinking about expectations and how easy it is to delay reaching out to other people in our families because we think we're always going to have another day. Or dropping my husband off at the train station and not kissing him good bye because I was irritated about something minor we were discussing in the car. Or not staying in touch with a friend because I have too much work to do. It's so easy to forget that something that can change your life forever can happen only in a few seconds and you might never get the chance to do something that you meant to do.

So I wanted to use this post to encourage everyone out there to stop and look at the people in your life. Call up a parent or a sibling that you haven't talked to in a while, even if you don't have a reason. Be sure to part ways from your spouse or partner or children in the morning in a positive way. Look up an old friend and send them an email and let them know you're still thinking about them.

Peace to all of you this weekend. May you be happy and have the warmth of the people you care about around you.