“A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;” 

Ecclesiastes 3:4

This week has been a bit difficult from two extremes.

A time to weep…a time to mourn,

First my friend Janie (name changed). During the summer her father, who had been cancer free, was now deemed terminally ill, as the cancer returned. Sometime this year he would be gone, her family was told, which may take a few months or a few weeks.  As the summer wore on, Janie’s father stopped eating, and he lost a lot of weight. Mentally he just wasn’t there. Then came this week. He went into a deep sleep and within two to three days, he was gone. Janie  told me  that she had accepted his passing, but when I saw her the next day she was tired as she got no sleep the night before, saying she “had to get out of there.” My thought: it is one thing to say you accept loosing your father, but quite another when you witness your father is no longer in this world, but of another. As I texted her to see how her day was going, she responded by saying it was okay, and she was “just taking it a day at a time.” Weeping and mourning…

“…and a time to laugh;…and a time to dance”

It had been a year in the making, but today would be the last time I would be working with John; after today he begins enjoying retirement. I noticed that as the time came closer to his last day of work, John was more relaxed, showing ear-to-ear smiles as the time drew near. A man full of wisdom, I will miss the end of the work day, when there was just him and me, and we would have deep conversations. Today we left the office together and got into our cars, left our parking spaces at the same time, and as we parted ways, I put my hand out the window  and waved to him, as tears came to my eyes; I will truly miss a coworker that I trained to do the job but actually he taught me so much more. OMG, the tears are coming again, as I know John is laughing and doing his happy dance…

In a space of time, this has been an emotional week for me, seeing two people react in different ways for different reasons. I mourn with Janie and rejoice with John, crying through it all.