So here is my first blog page, written from a hospital room where my good friend Debbie is in a coma and her body is shutting down.
This is a time when we decide about the value of life and journey of death. We have gentle music going in the background, we talk to her about our memories of our short life together and of our hope for a future.
As I sit here and deal with my own emotions of letting go, I wonder how many people today will die alone. How many lack friends who can sit by their side when the time comes?
How many will be missed?
Earlier in the cafeteria I met an older gentleman. He told me that he buried his second wife last week, after several months of hospital and nursing home stays. Today he is going to lose one of his friends. He was alone and so we talked for a while, shared a meal together.Strangers brought together by the common pain of losing someone they care for.
Will I be the only person he gets to talk with today? Does he have other friends who walk this road with him, to hear his memories of his wife, to laugh and cry with him?
That is really what Community Development is all about.... to come together in times of crisis, in times of death, in times of joy.
To have friends that care, so that we do not have to walk the road alone.
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