Two Sides

The glass half full, the glass half empty; isn't it strange how just about anything can be viewed from opposite sides. There's the big house on the hill. But inside there is a pit of unhappiness, money can't fill. There is the child with CP; twisted, unable to speak, but exuding an unconditional love that would settle wars. Do you want what they have, all of it, the good and the bad? For both sides make the package. And what about the people that you meet? What about yourself? Today, I'm wallowing in, "What about me?"

Right now, my litany is rooted in darkness, accented with words like fat, soft, headache, mediocre, and tired.

I once knew a woman, who on her death bed was about to confess her darkest secrets of a past she wasn't proud of. She wanted me to know that she wasn't always wonderful. I stopped her, saying, "It's the you of today. Your life brought you here." It was that woman, whom I loved. I miss her. Why did she want me to know?

When I saw her last, many years ago, she was just about my age now. Back then she had the wisdom of age, mixed with a wisdom only terminal cancer bestows. Strange how only when one is ravaged, that the importance of life is laid before you. She saw only goodness. So what would she see in me today?

In the quiet, I hear her answer: A mother, a writer, a knitter, a listener, a home brewer, a maple sugarmaker, a walker, a taxi driver, a teacher, a painter, a brewer, a mathematician, a reluctant cleaner, a cook, a closet sewer and quilter, a lover, a friend, a gardener, a church goer, a leader of young girls, a joker, a mediator, a homework helper, a disciplinarian, a motorcycle momma, a finder of lost things, a squirrelly thinker and problem solver.... someone to count on, a glass not blackened with emptiness, but overflowing.

Why does it take the whisperings from a death bed long gone cold to put life in perspective?