My heart aches today. Aches because a friend lost her husband yesterday in a motor cross accident. He was young, healthy, and full of life. He left behind a pregnant wife due to deliver their third child in the next few weeks and two other young children. I am still in shock. I hate thinking about it but it has once again served as a reminder that I need to refocus my life and my priorities.

As I helped my children hang the Christmas ornaments on our tree yesterday, my perspective changed. Rather than hurrying to "fix" what they had already hung to fill in spots that needed decorating, I just watched my kids faces as they helped with excitement. So, if you visit and think that my tree looks a little heavily decorated with ornaments on the bottom right side, you are right.

I think my dad summed it up earlier today when he wrote this: In perhaps my favorite novel, Chaim Potok's wise father, David Malter, says it this way,

"I learned a long time ago...that the blink of an eye in itself is nothing. But
the eye that blinks, that is something. A span of life is nothing. But the man who lives that span, he is something. He can fill that tiny span with meaning, so its quality is immeasurable though its quantity may be insignificant. A man must fill
his life with meaning, meaning is not automatically given to life. It is hard work to fill one's life with meaning."

The "meaning" of our life is worth pondering. My heart goes out to this young mother who is now left to raise three beautiful children on her own. How lucky we are to know and understand the plan of salvation. She will be reunited with her sweet husband someday. For now I like to think he is there preparing their unborn child to take care of his mother.