Life is very very short

Yesterday I was told one of my close relatives had died. Even though I knew he was troubled, I was still shocked by his death. Death has a funny way of doing that. Shocking us. Even though we all know we are going to die someday. Guaranteed. We are born to die. Yet it still shocks us.

Yesterday I could not get the memories of my cousin out of my head. I kept thinking about our days of innocence. When we grew up together on Cedar Hill with not a care in the world. When families were families. When we all visited the homestead every single day and played together as brothers, sisters, cousins, neighbours, friends. How one did nothing without the others. We were a pack. A tribe. We had each other’s back.

I thought back to the days when we roamed the hills from dawn to dusk. Our parents never worrying about where we were. Giving us the freedom to explore. Knowing we were safe as a tribe. Taking comfort in the fact that we had each other’s backs.

I thought about how we all had stars in our eyes. How the world was ours to take on and none of us feared for or thought about the future.  How we just lived in the moment. Playing Cowboys and Indians. Football. Our homestead the gathering spot. Swimming off the rocks. Picnics.  

I thought about how our paths had started out the same but somehow they had separated. Each of us taking the paths we were destined to take. Pulling us far apart and onto our individual life paths. Our journeys very different. Often never to cross again with the same intimacy.  I thought about how I used to love my cousin because he was so handsome. So suave. So sure of where he was going. How envious I was of him that everyone wanted him and no one even noticed me. Awe mixed with pride mixed with envy and love was how I felt about him. I just knew he was destined for great things. How could he not?  Everyone was under his spell.

But then something happened that I will never know nor understand. Something no one else but he will truly know or understand that took him down a path that he could not turn back from. A path that led him to a great darkness that engulfed him. Pulled him in and he was never able to find his way back.

I think now about when I saw him last. How I remember thinking all the light had gone out of his eyes. About how I felt his soul calling, crying for help. But his pride veiled it. Keeping him shrouded in the darkness. I think about what more could I have done, he have done, we as a family could have done to help him, bring him back from his place of darkness. But I know it is too late for that now. That his destiny has played out in the way it was meant to play out. That his time had come. And all I hope is that he finally found the light he was looking for. That he understood the darkness that took him from us long ago. That he made peace with himself and all that was weighing him down.

And I will hold on to the memory of him when we roamed the hills when we were young. When we believed in magic. When we had each other’s back. When we were family. And he used to smile that mischievous smile and we would melt. That’s how I will remember him forever.

Good bye my cousin for now. May your soul rest in peace. May your memory remind me that life is all about the paths we take. The choices we make. And more importantly it is knowing we are as great as we believe we are. As full of possibility as we believe we are. Because life is very ,very short in the grand scheme of things. And it is up to us to live it with intention and intensity while we have it.