Sleepless in Santa Monica

It’s 4 am and i can’t sleep. I know why. Yesterday I attended a memorial service of a friend of friend. I knew the woman who passed away and her husband casually. Met them a few times via a good friend, but hadn’t seen them in probably at least a year. The woman Susan Nelson Fleiss who died last week of colon cancer which was only diagnosed 3 short months ago was born the same year as me. She was thirty-five years old. She and her husband Eric have a 4 year old son, just a few months older than mine. They also have two twins that just turned one this past March. It was hard to even be at the memorial processing such a sudden death for i got the sense that many in her family still hadn’t even processed Susan’s sickness. It was truly horrible.

I can’t even explain why I feel such profound sadness thinking about Susan’s death, the scattered emotional wreckage left behind that was so apparent when her two sisters and wounded husband Eric spoke poignently at her memorial. I know it has something to do with the parallel life stage that we seemed to be at – the still blossoming relationships and families so suddenly torn apart, the lingering questions of what it means for children to grow up without a doting parent. Still, why I can’t seem to contemplate this from afar, why I can’t shake my head at it the same way I do every morning when i read about tragedy in the news or see it on tv and then just move on with my day, I can’t really explain. This one seems to have cut deep for some strange reason. I can’t get it out of my mind.

Contrary to most people’s assumptions, I don’t consider myself a religious person. It used to be fashionable to say I was spiriitual, but I’m not sure what that really means either. Do I believe in something greater than myself? I guess. It seems presumptuous to think that the whole Universe is vast conspiracy just to rpoduce me. Do I have a name for whatever this thing is that I believe in? Do I think it has any real sense of virtue or vice, sacred or profance, right or wrong? Not in times like these, I don’t. Many people rely on their faith duing times like this. They depend on God to pull them through the worst. I admire that. Applaud it and find comfort in other people’s comfort not matter how they attain it. But I’m one of those guys who seriously questions and falls back on the old cliche wondering why if there is any force of goodness in the Universe, any arbitraror of karmic consequence, then how could something like this happen? Long ago I got over my belief in God – at least the stereotypical Godhead type that sits in the clouds whimseclally making decisions about the fates of billions and collateral fates of billions more. Moments like these solidify that skepticism for me.

I was looking at my schedule today. It’s filled with meetings that just a few days ago seemed so critical – junction points in my life that if they went the right way would have so much consequence. Now – I can’t even remember their order. They seem so meaningless, so empty and insignificant. I feel like cancelling them all, taking my son out of school and going for an ice cream. I think I’ll just hug my wife, tell her I love her, maybe go for an early dinner that’s too expensive, and climb in bed early with the family. And stare up at the ceiling not sleeping wondering about it all.

p.s. – When I am up like this in the middle of the night, I invariably just Google whatever is on my mind and found the following. Just in case any of this moves you the way it has me. In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made in Susan’s memory to Camp Kesem, a summer camp for children whose parents have or had cancer. Gifts may be made online at www.campkesem.org by selecting "Donate- In Honor/Memory Of," or via checks sent to Camp Kesem, In Memory of Susan Fleiss, P.O. Box 1113, Lafayette, CA 94549.