Short, but beautiful

March 9, 2012

Bittersweet
She said she usually cried
at least once each day
not because she was sad
but because the world was so beautiful
& life was so short.
~Storypeople

It’s been one of those years in which life’s beauty
and its brevity have both taken center stage.

As we age, we start losing people
and the loss gets our attention in a big way.

First, it’s famous people, movie stars, government officials,
people who have made up the wallpaper of our lives.
Like Elizabeth Taylor.
Or Jack LaLanne–almost 100 years old when he passed.

“Are they really that old, already?” we ask ourselves.
“How could it be?”

And then, we start losing friends and peers,
and it becomes clear that this life is finite.
That we, too, will face our own end.

Oh, we’ve always known.
We just didn’t believe it.

One of my friends has suffered chronic
pain for some years. Serious pain. Pain that would
send most of us to our knees. And our beds.

But not him.

He embraces life with everything he has.
There’s no new experience too crazy for him
and no old beloved one that he doesn’t want to revisit,
even through his pain.

He gets it:
life is short.
There’s so much beauty.
Enjoy it while you can.

I love this life.
But I also know that it’s not the end.
That we’re here to learn something
and that there will be more to learn
in our next life.

And more to do.

Even better, paths that have crossed will cross again.

What a great comfort that is!

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