Because I really don't do bleak

Just got some awful news. Why am I writing that here, on this seemingly forgotten space? Because the best way for me to deal with hard things is to look harder for and appreciate the good things in my life. I want to hold on to and remember them. For awhile now this might also be my therapy page, so who knows what one might find here should one stumble upon this place. My sentences may be fragmented. You will most likely not get the whole story, or even half of it. But I will record here the simple things that keep me going through whatever lies ahead. But it's my space and I can write if I want to.

A phone call from my daughter asking if my mother (who'd been fasting all day for some medical tests) had eaten yet and offering to go to Rhumbi and pick up a salad (or rice bowl--I can't remember which) with salmon for her grandmother. Because she knows my mom just got some awful news and she also knows my mom likes salmon and because she too feels the compelling need to do something to make this better. I love especially the detail of the salmon. Of remembering what my mother ordered just a few weeks ago when we all had lunch together. Of wanting especially to pick up something that would sound good to my mother. I cannot even tell you how deeply that touched my heart.

The way at least four or five times hospital staff and volunteers asked--not just my mom, but also me--if there was anything we needed. Anything they could do or get for us. The way they bring me a special order of apple-cranberry juice on pebble ice. The way there is no limit to the number of warm blankets they will bring my mother, who has not been warm for hours.

Several simple and seemingly (but not) small gestures from my husband: getting in the car Friday morning and finding a full gas tank. We didn't know what lay ahead that horrible awful no good Friday the 13th, but it was a blessing to not have to waste time filling the car with gas to get me where I needed to be. Coming home well after midnight to find leftovers from the dinner I had planned to attend with him in the fridge. Comfort food, not less. Just what I needed, despite the late (or early, as it were) hour. And a handful of peppermint candy--a particular favorite of mine--under my pillow.

Meeting my mother's good friend. I need to write more about this friendship, but I'm not sure when or how. How do you explain to someone who doesn't believe she believes in God that I believe her friendship with my mother is a gift from God? Indeed I know it. And how, upon first meeting her, I believe we will become friends as well. Indeed I want to be her friend. And how do you find words to tell someone thank you for being that kind of the friend to your mother, who has often wished and wanted for just such a friend?