Upon reflection

Yesterday’s blog post made me think about the pandemic, and the last sixteen-and-a-halfish months (but who’s counting?). Then I came across a quote this morning, that also made me think: “Forget the mistake. Remember the lesson.”

And it made me realize that out of the catastrophe that was 2020, there are some really valuable lessons we can take with us into whatever comes next; and that I hope we — myself included — do learn them, hang on to them, remember them and live our lives going forward accordingly.

I have had countless conversations this past year — with friends, clients, former colleagues, family, Facebook friends, virtual strangers while I was getting my COVID-19 vaccines and probably a few others I’m forgetting. I don’t think I’ve ever talked so much — or listened to so many other people who also had a lot on their minds — in my life before. Which, in itself tells you something — which is a topic for another day.

Day 198. Missing Them

February is a difficult month for me.  Oh, I know, lots of folks suffer through February.  It can be a dreary month; and by the time we’ve gotten through November and December and January we’re worn down by winter.  And can’t wait for Spring.

But that’s not my problem.

Three beloved family members have been taken from me, in February.  Stolen, I sometimes think.  My cousin, who was more like my sister.  My mother’s twin sister, who was my other mother, my confidante and friend.  And my mother.

Cheryl (my cousin) passed a long time ago. In 1976, when she was only twenty-four years old, of what was diagnosed as fulminating hepatitis.  Which it couldn’t have been, because her dad died of the exact same thing when she was thirteen months old.  Clearly she’d inherited something.  So much for the accuracy of autopsies.

Anyway, she died on February 15.  Her mother, on February 3, 2000; and my mother on February 26, 2007.

Bizarre, isn’t it?  That the three of them would all die in the same month.  Like some strange, twisted, cruel co-incidence.  Or, maybe not.  I’ll never know.  Or will I?

What’s really a bit spooky is something my mother told me, not all that long before she died.  She said she’d been having