Every day babies are born and every day someone says goodbye to a loved one.

During Easter week I was been confronted with this truth again and again.

I like Disneyland where everyone is always happy.

Neverland, where no one grows old.

During this time of reminders my being is seeking to embrace or at least accept the fragility of life. The impermanence and the unexpected changes that cause our road trip to come to a screeching halt.

Life is sacred and short and so easily taken for granted.

In one week several friends said a final goodbye to loved ones who had left in many ways earlier through Alzheimers. A beloved, shining, inspiring health coach ended her fight with cancer. A young man in our high school is gone, inexplicably and far too young. A loving father is dearly missed. And a Saviour celebrated who crossed that bridge at 30. Wherever I turn, I see the vulnerable reality that I so often choose to ignore.

My heart feels tender, a bit beat up and raw. Vulnerable.

It’s harder to trust it could never happen to me or my loved ones.

So it is.

Gratitudes: I am grateful for life and breath

and that my greatest physical challenge is unruly swelling around my eyes, products of decades of severe allergies—allergies which I gratefully experience far less often.

I am grateful for my husband and my kids. Grateful and aware that their presence in my life is a gift not to be taken for granted.

I’m grateful for my parents. That I can still call them and see them, even if those times are few and far between. And for so many others that still live and breathe, take up space and occasionally share a meal, laughter and a hug with me.

I’m grateful for perspective. That all the striving and doing REALLY doesn’t matter so very much in the end, though it’s a fun snd enjoyable challenge.

I’m grateful for the yin and yang, the light and dark, the exquisite and the painful that make up the full rich tapestry of life.

I am grateful to bear witness and hold space and marvel at the resilience and majesty of those who surround me.

For all this and more, I remain grateful.

The Real, The Raw, the Human Gift