An Empty Chair

It's funny how quickly everything that seems important can fall to the way side with a single sentence.

Suddenly it doesn't matter that you're not a size 3. The silverware being mismatched is not longer an issue. It's no big deal that your salary doesn't allow for grand vacations or fantastic shopping sprees. Your car gas mileage doesn't mean anything anymore.

Everything that completely and totally consumes our everyday lives is suddenly trivial in the space of a heart beat.

When someone completely irreplaceable dies.
Gone.
Forever.

The ground falls out from underneath you.

Who cares how many calories were in the fucking bagel, or whether or not you can get organic produce?
Who gives a shit about the tear in the curtains or the mud in the carpet?

You hear those three, most dreaded words in the universe and everything stops. It stops moving, it stops mattering. And you fall.
Desperate to keep moving, keep doing, distract yourself enough and maybe the broken record inside your head will be drowned out. Maybe if you move fast enough you'll stop falling, maybe you'll fly. Maybe you'll reach the surface and see that it was all a nightmare.
But it's not. It's horribly, heartlessly, real. And there's not a thing you can do.

Gawk is dead.
She's gone.
I will never see her again.

Death is not something I handle very gracefully. I can't sleep. God I wish I could just sleep.
But if I stop, even pause to take a breath, I'll hear those three words again. And again. And again.

If you pray, say a prayer for her family. Her husband who is in the hospital, sisters one of whom is in the hospital, and parents. Please.