This morning we got the news at work that a co-worker died last night. Victor had cancer, and they thought he’d beaten it, then it came back. He was an African immigrant who always had a smile and a kind word. He worked in our warehouse, ending as a supervisor, but knew enough about chemistry to tell one of our drug companies that the chemical description in their literature didn’t match the drawing of the atomic structure. I’d give him daily brain teaser puzzles, which he loved.
And just now, another co-worker, a team member, just had her sister fatally killed by the sister’s ex, and the mother was also shot and is in critical condition.
Sometimes I just want to close the gate on my farm and never leave.
It’s hard to find words for either loss. Cancer sucks because t here doesn’ t seem to be any way to avoid it. And violence, like the murder, is so random it’s scary. We just had a murder trial finish locally in which a guy shot his estranged wife, his two daughters, and his wife’s grandmother, killing them all. He let his young son live.
I am sorry for you and your friends. I’ll remember you and yours in my prayers tonight.
Thanks, everyone, for the condolences. My pets are one thing that keeps me sane when the outside world isn’t. Although having to cats decide to loudly scrap at 3:00 in the morning makes me rethink that view!
I keep checking the news sites to see how the mother in the shooting is doing, but they aren’t updating them.
Your initial story reminds me of a friend of mine in college who was getting his degree with me, and we were in the same service fraternity. He was from the UAE and had a brain tumor that he didn’t tell ANYBODY about. His death was all the more tragic because he was young, it was completely unexpected, and there was no chance to say goodbye because nobody had known he could basically drop dead any day. But he wanted it that way…
