Another Day, Another Funeral...

Seems as though lately, this is what I've been doing.

Today, a group of us trekked up to Toowoomba to show our support to one of the Area Supervisors I look after as he said goodbye to his younger brother, taken away from this world at the age of 54, after 10-month courageous battle of leukaemia.

You know, I thought, not having a personal stake on the deceased, having that distance from the man my dear boss had to bury, would also have toughened my heart, just a little. But I found a single tear rolled down my cheek, touched by the moving tribute the deceased's wife had made to her husband of ten years. I found a small part of me questioning God, once more, if it had been a fair decision to take him from the people who had clearly loved him dearly far too soon. And perhaps, there was a small niggling fear gnawing on the inside, as I looked around and noted the white hairs on some of my other bosses today, and finding out their ages, that I would have to say goodbye to the people I've worked closely with, and loved in a certain way, in my life time. And that reality, brought even more real to me by the conversation I had with my boss' wife, hit it home; that they are approaching the age in which some of their friends are nearing the end of their lives, and this saying goodbye might have to become a regular occurrence one must accustom yourselves with.

But today, I want to write about the positives; the sense of camaraderie our organisation has formed. I was chatting to my husband about having to go to this funeral last night, and I made a comment that never before, in my professional life, I have ever encountered this sense of compassion, as I have by being part of this particular organisation. Yes, we go about our days, completing our tasks; yes, we stop and 'play' from time to time, and for a little while, our colleagues become more than just a bunch of people I work with; yes, we go about our lives, we have our own family and circle of friends we socialise with, separate from our professional lives.

But days like these, going to a funeral of a man who is, literally, a stranger to me, whose association only extends so far as my working for his older brother, and finding a band of us going to the funeral simply to support the man we currently work with, I see the strong bond of the community we have formed; thicker and stronger than blood sometimes are. It is the support you can count on, and one that will remain there, available to be called upon whenever one is in need.