A loss

Young adulthood is a sometimes frantic, sometimes fragile time: finding a life beyond school, getting to know yourself, making new friends while trying to keep old ones, and ultimately finding your voice. Often this is hard, yet sometimes there are bright spots along the way. When I needed one very much, I found a bright spot in a friend's mother.

A few words came to mind quickly as I tried to think how best to describe the friend we have lost: genuine, full of life, caring, enthusiastic, cute. She loved family and friends, music and art, food and travel. Life was a bright and colorful adventure, if you only looked.

She had an absolute and unerring ability to find something positive in almost everything and everyone. Had she worked in politics, she could have mastered the art of "spinning" something to the best possible interpretation. Fortunately, for those of us who called her a friend, she focused her natural enthusiasm toward our lives. That "Pollyanna" viewpoint was even infectious; it was hard to stay down for long when she kept pointing out the silver linings you had missed.

I think what I will remember most is T's delight with life. She smiled readily, and easily befriended virtually everyone around her. Age did not matter, perhaps because she refused to observe her own age. Her spirit remained young, even as her body aged. She befriended young and old with equal relish, and both young and more senior friends will mourn her loss.

On the death of a friend's mother

I have now reached an age where it becomes more familiar to learn of the death of a friend's parent. In earlier years, it was less common; only accidents or critical illness robbed some far earlier than seemed fair.

Now, it is age that has become first an enemy, and then the thief. We accept the changes as our parents become less themselves, even as the memory of the former self lingers with us.

It is never easy to lose a loved one, yet it sometimes still seems right. We just hope for pleasant dreams as they slip quietly away during sleep.

Lewis Carroll said it rather well...

One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. "Which road do I take?" she asked. "Where do you want to go?" was his response. "I don't know," Alice answered. "Then," said the cat, "it doesn't matter."

More on technology advancements

This message is written from my notebook PC, which is running on battery power (the power is out due to severe storms last night) and being transmitted via servers/infrastructure running on UPS power. I'm sitting in a dark office, typing by the glow of my notebook's display....

I find it interesting that we can keep all of these things up and running while something as basic as overhead office lighting and air conditioning are out of service.

Isn't technology grand?

When it works, at least. I'm posting this observation through email. Comments/ideas for future musings follow.

- Clarity of the sky and brightness of the stars while camped in Maine.
- The virtues of "chicken lobsters."
- The realization that your kid knows as much (more?) about navigating through a large city as you.

Clearly, it remains to be seen

... whether I have anything worthwhile to say here. Possible subjects: cinema, web design observations, links of interest, digital photography, camping, music, probably more.

A beginning

How original.
This is the start; if only I had something truly profound to say. Instead, perhaps I'll just use a quote.
I'm slightly unsure of the origin, but believe it to be from either Gerald or Sara Murphy, friends of Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald ... "Living well is the best revenge."