Saying Goodbye...

I know that death is a part of life; it comes to greet us unexpectedly; that unless you've found a substance that will give you immortality, it is inevitable that one day, God will come knocking and tell you 'this is it! Ready or not, you're coming with me... NOW!'

I guess, throughout growing up, having experienced the first death in my family in the form of an ailing grandmother, in which the last... 18-24 months of her seventy-fifth year of her life confined in firstly a hospital bed, and then in her own bed, battling cancer, I always thought that the kind of death that would greet each and every one of us was one that came when our hairs had gone all grey or white; when all our skins had wrinkled, showing both wisdom gained from old age and life experienced to the fullest; when time had slowed and dragged you were at the point of waiting for your life on earth to end and another kind of life to begin.

I guess it hit me hard and raw then, to find that a close family friend was called to join God in Heaven when she was in mid-fifty of age, after a very short battle of pancreatic cancer. She was a loving Mother, a doting wife, and the kind of friend who would welcome your visit with open arms no matter the hour. She had an infectious giggle, and one in which I could still hear, so very clearly, from time to time, in my mind.

Not long after that, a friend of mine I met online passed away from a bad case of multiple sclerosis; she was a few months short of her 31st birthday! In the course of less than three weeks, I have had to say goodbye to two dear friends, neither of which I was prepared to let go just yet.

Last year came, and the shock of losing my Director, the man whom, to this day, I regard very highly of, rocked me to the very core. I can't tell you how much my heart sank, lower than the ground my feet stood upon. I can't tell you how many times I've cried myself to sleep, and in the briefest of moments when I opened my eyes, believed that what had happened had been nothing but a bad dream, a cruel joke of my subconscious, until reality sank in and wrenched my heart six feet under once more. I can't tell you how many mornings I've had to control myself from breaking down and become a blubbering mess, my eyes filled with tears I had to wipe away so that I could still see the road whilst I drove myself to work. I can't tell you how many times I've subconsciously looked for any sign of my Director to waltz in through the front door, wishing for the kind of miracle you've read in the Bible, of someone being resurrected from death, to come true. Of all the deaths I've had to deal with in my life, his was, in my honest opinion, the most tragic, the saddest, and one that made me question my beliefs in God.

I woke up on Tuesday, 22 February, at a relatively early hour; so uncharacteristically of me. I spent the hour before I had to go down and have breakfast at this hotel/conference venue bawling my eyes out, remembering that this time last year, my life was about to change forever; that what I thought was another ordinary work day, ready to see the down-to-earth, compassionate Director we have all come to know and love, was going to turn out to be one of the saddest day of my life to date. The more I conjured up images and memories of this man whom, to his final hour, remained optimistic and empowering to those who knew him, the more tears flowed down my cheeks uncontrollably at the unfairness of his passing, taken away from us way too soon.

Eight-twenty that morning, almost exactly at the same time the news of his passing was broken so gently to me, I received another phone call; one that would make me relive this painful memory once more. A dear work colleague of mine, a PA to the company's Deputy Executive Director, whom had been diagnosed with inoperable brain tumour in September last year, passed away at 1:30AM the same morning.

I was inconsolable; two tragic deaths in exactly one year, to me, was just that little bit unbearable. I roamed around for a whole day in a daze, trying my best to converse and function, when all I wanted to do was curl myself up in a hole, closed my eyes, and pretended that this day, last year and this year, never happened.

And so I found myself attending yet another funeral service, saying goodbye to a wonderful friend whose life had been cut way too short; another beacon of hope in our lives; a wonderful, lighthouse-like presence; a wonderful, 47-year-old who had lived to the fullest and never once complained about the injustice of the fate she had been dealt with (unlike the host of family/friends/colleagues who had raged about such cruelty).

Perhaps I will become more accustomed to this as I grow older; as I am more exposed to more deaths, in whatever shapes and forms God call one's soul to join Him. But for now... it really is impossibly hard to say goodbye to the people you don't want to let go just yet, and I can't help but feel just a tad bitter at the unfairness of it all...