For Karen

The grandma with the sparkly eyes and the ever-generous smile. That's what she was.

When someone suffers a loss as sudden as our good friend did last night, there are no words - other than it isn't fair, it isn't right and this shouldn't be - that flow through my mind.

Sometimes life doesn't make sense, and we are all trying to make as much sense of it that we can. We (the people on the outside) are in care taking mode, baking cookies and thinking about meals we are going to prepare for their families, our friends, the flowers which will be purchased, the ache that we wish we could make disappear.

Some of us are half-way around the world, which makes this hole we are feeling for our friend even worse. Out of our three very close families, one third of us have lost a parent. Two of us have had close calls. We know how precious life is, we know how deep the hurt feels.

We will do our best to let him know this. He, who has lost a mother, a friend, a cheerleader. We will let his family know too, let them know that we are here, if only for a shoulder to lean on or a distraction for the kids who will not feel their grandmother's hugs again, no matter how hard they try.

For them, I cry.

I cry because I know. I cry because it hurts. I cry because we just climbed the hill of the anniversary (he died in on a hiking trip in Alaska 4 years ago, he never met Katie but knew she was on her way) of my father-in-law's death just 10 days ago. I cry because just weeks after he passed, our other dear friend lost her father too. All within a month's time of each other. And now this.

It isn't right.

It isn't fair.

Please, please think, pray, meditate for our friends and the woman they will miss so much.