What a beautiful day. Diane and I took a quick snow shoe this morning in brilliant sun. I got back just in time to make a call with my friend ‘S’ from Bangalore India. S and I have been friends for a couple of year’s. I only recently learned that her brother died unexpectedly last spring. We’d exchanged a few notes, but I really wanted to get together to talk about our losses and healing. We spent about 45 minutes taking about Sam, her brother, our families, and our healing. It was really good sharing stories, good and bad about how we and our loved ones were doing. We talked for a long whole about our paths back into work.. and the difficulties that was still presenting us both. Everyone’s story is different.. even so, there are many parallels in our paths through loss and healing even though we live  in very different cultures on opposite ends of the earth  .

   I decided to work at home today which was pretty relaxing, even though . I had a pretty full work day. One great thing about working at home is that you can do other stuff while on conference calls… Other things like taking pictures of the aliens in your wooden ceiling 

  The day passed very quickly. Before I knew it was dinner time. Diane and some friends were headed to a movie so I grabbed Max and Gabe and took them to Bridge Street for dinner.  It’s always fun going there.. we always run into many folks we know.

  

We headed home around 7:30 to intercept my good friend Kerry, his son Mike and Mike’s friends Connor and Jack. Kerry had told me he was coming by because Mike and his buddies had ‘something’ to give us. Well, that ‘something’ was a box filled with donations to Sam’s fund. The boys had organized a 3 way birthday party in the Underhill town center.   Instead of asking for gifts, they’d asked their friends to consider making donations for Sam’s fund instead. They’d hired a DJ (Bucky B) and stuck a donation box with Sam’s picture. By the end of the night with over $800 !!!   (The floor even collapsed !)

It was such a moving and generous thing for these kids to do. In honor of their generosity.. I offered to eat a spoon of peanut butter, A1 sauce and whipped cream…Believe me, it didn’t taste as good as it sounds….

 

After Kerry and the boys left, I went out to the lab and made another blinking beer tray… This one is blue.

 

 I’m hoping to trade it for an extra ticket to tomorrow night’s Keller Williams show at Higher Ground so I can take a friend. I’ve already traded one of these things for entry to a show..   Should be a great show.. see you there Sam !

-jc