Best of times, worst of times

Life has been a bit of a wild, crazy time lately and this forum, as important as it is to me, had to go on the back burner for a while.  It'll take me a while to catch up, for sure.

I'll start with the worst of times, we lost 3 friends in 3 weeks.  Talk about grieving, my goodness, my husband and I can't remember crying so much.  The first was quite unexpected and was my best friend's aunt.  She slipped on the ice, ended up with a brain bleed they couldn't stop.  Our families have been very close for nearly 50 years, so it was like losing my very own aunt since she never married or had children of her own but made a point of telling all of us what a joy we were to her.  The second, a day later, was my husband's best friend of 47 years.  He had stage 4 thymus cancer.  His last 2 weeks he spent in the hospital and we spent a lot of time there.  At the time of his passing there were 12 of us at his bedside, all with our hands on him while he made the peaceful transition.  So thankful for this man and the affect he had on so many lives.  Grass never grew under his feet, not for one minute.  What an example he was.  The third, was this friend's mom, she passed a week & a half after her son, she had alzheimers.  Although that wasn't an unexpected passing, it stung never-the-less.  Too much grief.  And as many of you that know me here, I recently lost my own mom to that terrible affliction.  Just a reminder of how fragile life is and that we need to celebrate each moment we're blessed with. 

The best of times?  We had some events planned that happened to coincide with the above mentioned and we were able to attend those things.  We went to a concert with friends to see Herman's Hermits, the Buckingham's and the Grass Roots.  Fantastic!!  And the next event, one of our daughters gave us tickets to see "2 cellos".  I highly recommend it if you get a chance.  Two guys in their 30's maybe that play everything from classical music to rockin out.  What a show it was and they're funny too.  The third, my husband bought expensive tickets to see Dancin' With The Stars live tour.  We got to meet & greet, picture taking and drink with them.  It was awesome!!!  Only one problem with that last show, apparently cause we spent so much time at the hospital with our dying friend I got a nasty case of the flu.  Normally I would not have gone anywhere but felt like I had to go.  Totally worth it.  When my husband came down with it, after me, he had to attend the celebration of life for his friend and speak too.  Not like you can postpone that. 

We're all on the upswing now.  Tomorrow I'm going to see my primary though because I when had the flu, I coughed and coughed and coughed so hard, I swear I gave myself a hernia where my lowest incision was.  Is that even possible???  I have no idea, it's been 5-1/2 years since my surgery.  I guess I'll soon find out.

Hoping everyone is doing well here.....back to my catching up.

Donna~