The Tiny Corners Journal

A post I wrote back in November but didn’t publish (until now):

I spent some time tonight missing my friend GAC.  Part of it is November in and of itself, and part of it is the resurrection of the ‘tumor.  With missing GAC and the heyday of the old ‘tumor, I also miss the simplicity of all our lives back then.  That be dust in the wind, tho, and while those times have and deserve my heart and my respect, it isn’t something on which I often dwell.

Except in November.  I always miss my friend, but especially in November.  It’s odd the best Thanksgiving I ever had was just days after her death.  Every other Thanksgiving I have attended or hosted before or since then have been events constructed to follow the expected patterns of food, family, entertainment.  That Thanksgiving, nearly 5 years ago now, many of us were so painfully thankful for everything, because we had an acute awareness of  how insanely quick everything can pass.

We were all grieving and likely still in complete shock, but there was this palpable sense of joy (?) all the same, at least for me.  We sat, as friends and family and strangers, at long tables pushed together - sharing our food, our sorrow, our lives.