the weather and funerals...

I am going to attend a funeral today of a very good acquaintance, no, a friend. Initially, his mom (who was doing the planning) was concerned that it might rain today, hoping that it wouldn't. I have other thoughts... I remember when my mother died and on the day of her funeral, it was bright, sunshiny and beautiful! I was disappointed, thinking that the clouds ought to rain too, to cry as much as I had been crying. And so, on days of funerals, I tend to keep that thought in the back on my mind, hoping for rain. I ought to just change my way of thinking though. The fact that the weather is nice shows that life goes on and passing away is a part of life.

This Christmas, I am attending a Christmas party with mutual friends of my friend who is being buried today. It's a small gathering, but a tradition we had been having for many, many years. I am enclosing a letter in my gift to my other friends, one that describes how much I appreciate them and why. Since it takes me so long to write an actual letter, getting the wording just right, I've been making first drafts already (and won't need to be finished for at least a week.) I want the letters to be just right...I'm better writing what I want to say rather than saying it...and I want my other friends to know I love them very much and what they mean to me.