May Their Memory Be for a Blessing

I'm clearly not the most diligent journal entry writer am I? Sigh. Well, here I am feeling somewhat introspective again because of reminders of my mortality.

When I was growing up there were two families we spent a lot of time with. The parents were funny and smart, they were Jewish, and had children the same age as we were (they both had sons my age). The boys and I all went to the same elementary school and went through Sunday School, Hebrew School, our Bar and Bat Mitzvah year, and convocation together. We spent hours together talking and sharing hijinks as kids. We weren't particularly close after High School, but one of them was my first roommate when I moved out into an apartment on my own. He was cool with me getting Traife, my first cat! When I moved back to Chapel Hill, his children have become regular babysitters for my son (mostly his daughter, but every now and again his son does it). The other became an academic who constantly shared pithy, funny, and incredibly insightful commentary on our 21st century society via social media. I loved reading his posts.

And you know what? Both have now been taken from us entirely too soon because of cancer. They were true mensches. They were making the world a better place, and they are gone. I do believe in g-d, but I really don't understand why she keeps having to take the good ones from us! With one it was a fairly sudden and precipitous event. He fought, but it was a rare and very aggressive cancer. The other fought as well, but Leukemia is ruthless isn't it?

I'm still processing these two departures this year and received news today that a former colleague just got taken down by testicular cancer. It brought tears for him, but also for these two men, for the friend we have who will eventually die from prostate cancer (battling for 11 years tho, an amazing story), for my step mother, and the first friend I lost.

zikhrono livrakha זיכרונו לברכה

(may their memory be for a blessing)

I did find some solace on the Debbie Friedman website attributed to her: "Remember, out of what emerges from life's painful challenges will come our healing."