Today I got some sad news, someone I have had rather a brief contact with, had tragically and very sudden passed away a few months ago. The only reason I learnt about this is because his colleague was cleaning out his desk and found a necklace of mine he had bought as a thanks-for-a-job-well-done-gift to a former employee. A gift he had obviously never gotten around to giving. What is it with those details in life, those things that can either be so very endearing and lovely or just so completely sad and lonely. The things we leave behind.
Through a lifetime we usually meet an impressive amount of people, tie different kinds of knots, brief or more profound, everything, everyone a large, smaller or tiny part of the web called life. Some people we never really get to know, for various reasons, others we get to know a whole lot more, sometimes very much more than we'd like to perhaps. Some people we would like to get to know more, to metaphorically pick their brains, and often we think we have all the time in the world to finally do so. But in a wink of a moment that possibility is taken away. Once again we're reminded of how fragile life, plans and thoughts are.
I didn't know very much about this person, other than that he was a never seize to amaze veritable goldmine of information when it came to music, movies and television. That he was some kind of technical nerd with an inventor's mind. That his neighbour's cat used to wait for him outside his local grocery store, follow him home and saw him as the perfect new landlord and servant. That he played the guitar and taped his worn shoes together just because he couldn't be bothered with getting a new pair at the moment. That he had a sister living in the US and his parents a big, black semi-menace of a cat named Tristan. That he had a very dry, often bull's eye kind of humour.
And that he left a necklace behind.
The web called life is so fragile. A brief encounter with someone when I might be in a bad mood could be the very last encounter with that particular person. I might never get a chance to repair that. Something to consider when we're less than friendly for all sorts of reasons we might find legitimate in the heat of the moment.
ReplyDeleteOn the one hand it feels *rather* restricted if we should walk round always thinking very careful about what we say and do, to everyone we meet. On the other hand taking a deep breath, a step back, if possible sleep on it, often makes for a better decision.
ReplyDeleteOverall, I very rarely regret the things I say or do, I kind of regret things I didn't say or do instead. I'm not all that sure that's a better thing...