what do you say?

My dear friend's son died on Monday. I found out last night. She called me this morning. I saw her number on my call display, and answered the phone already in tears. It was a real conversation. The kind she and I have been having for 33 years. She is a woman I can talk to, have deep conversations with, even when a year has passed between seeing each other. And her 25 year old son has died.

We were pregnant with our sons together. Mine born in September, hers a few months later. This was her third, my first. I confided in her one day "I don't know how to be a mother." It's ok, she assured me, your baby doesn't know that!

We have holidayed together, eaten meals together, cooked for each other, sat over many, many cups of coffee, or glasses of wine. We have laughed and laughed together. We have cried together. We cried together this morning.

But, really, what do you say? What can you say? She is a strong, empathic, powerful, intuitive woman. And, I am in awe of her strength and how completely her faith in the spiritual realm comforts her in this devastating moment of her life. Of her husband's, and her daughters' lives. Of all the countless people who knew, and loved her son. She will get through this, because she is destined to get through this. She knows, truly knows that all of it, all of this, is part of some much bigger plan. She knows.

All I know, is that I wish I could do something, say something, be something for her and her family right now.

I don't know what to say. But, I do know that I will go and see her, and we will have coffee, or tea, and we will sit and we will cry, and life will go on. Because it has to. Because all of it is happening for a reason, a reason that I cannot fathom.

I can't say anything. I can't do anything. I can just be. She can just be. We can all just be. And, life will go on. And, it will be different. It will never be the same. But, it will go on.

and the password is.....

OMG! I recently had to change my password on my facebook account because I had been hacked. Then my son informed me I should also change the password on my email, because, yes, I admit it, they were the same password. I use the same password for everything I can get away with....which of course I realize is dumb. So I changed my old familiar for two much more complicated and much less familiar code words.
So now I have a password for
facebook
email
school email
ravelry
twitter
yyoga
blogspot
bank
atm card
visa card
other visa card
well...you get the message and I am sure it is just the same for you.

The problem is...some days I just sit in front of the password prompt paralyzed. Early onset Alzheimer's? Maybe.
And when you get your password wrong they always seem to reply in RED, and often CAPITAL letters (I may be exaggerating about the capitals, but they feel like capitals). "Password incorrect, please re-enter." So, I re-enter, and ack! "password incorrect, please re-enter." I can't tell you how many times I have to send an email to some nameless machine to request a new password. I am such a dork.

And why do I have to feel like a dork? Because people are dishonest. Let's face it. The reason we need all these passwords is because people are dishonest. There it is, a huge, sweeping generalization. People are dishonest. Maybe not you, and maybe not me, but 'people' are. hmph!

I remember, and this is how old I am, when the only password I had to remember was my mother's maiden name. Of course, I could only reply to this verbally, because I have never been altogether sure how it is spelt. spelt - not the grain. Should I have said spelled? Well, that sounds dumb, and kindy dorky. But, you get my point.

So back to passwords. Don't use your profession, or pet's name, or kid's name, or your favourite wine (ok, that's my husband's, and his favourite wine is really complicated to spell). Use a password, 'they' say with a number, a lower case letter, and upper case letter, and a special character, and make sure it is at least 8 letters long. Really, how am I going to remember &gi9RY06!

Recently we all were assigned new passwords at work. Clearly it was felt we were not capable of coming up with our own. So, each person was assigned a word, with a special character plus their photocopying code.

My 'word' was a rather chubby, slow, animal. My colleagues, I discovered by sleuthing, were given their previous professions, or current professions. I was given a chubby, slow, blind animal. What's up with that? And how do I go to the IT guy and say wtf?

If I could have my perfect password it would be [space bar]. That would work because in my perfect world everyone would be honest.