The Nature of Bubbles

For those of you who don’t know, our family has lost two dear cousins and my dad this year. My dad passed away only two weeks ago. People ask how we’re doing and it’s a difficult question to ask and a difficult question to answer. We have a large extended family who are all sharing the same emotions right now which helps. We also all have wonderful networks of friends and co-workers who are always nearby for love and support.

The exhaustion and worry our whole family experienced over the past year with Ray, Alan and my dad’s illnesses, are now replaced not only by sadness for those who are no longer with us, but also with a new closeness to our loved ones. We were already a tight knit clan…cousins, aunts, uncles, lifelong friends, new friends...yet somehow we're even closer, now.

The sadness, however, frequently gives way to outrageous bouts of laughter and highly inappropriate remarks which I will share with you one day in the distant future. Very distant. There is no need for you to know the true depths of our depravity. You just aren’t ready for that. Trust me.

As we move forward, feel free to keep asking about us and about our mom and about our aunt and about our cousins. Don’t worry that a particular question will be inappropriate or might make us cry, because here’s the thing: there is no predicting what topic might make a person cry.

Yesterday, I spoke to someone about the flowers at my dad’s funeral for ten minutes without a hint of sadness or sentimentality. Thirty minutes later, I had to leave the room because someone mentioned Easter.

I explained to a friend that although we’re doing well, our emotions are always bubbling very near the surface and that, like bubbles, they suddenly appear and then *poof* they’re gone. You needn’t worry or feel uncomfortable around our occasional distant stares or teary eyes. It’s just the nature of bubbles.