Jenny.

I am a bad, bad little blogger.
I give myself a good excuse this week.

My dear friend Jennifer passed away on Tuesday in the late morning.
She had a very long surgery that day to remove some tumors which were caused by a disease called Nuerofibromatosis. She did not come out of the surgery.
Her family and I are very very heartbroken.

Jennifer was 32 years old, two months older than me. We have been friends since the 7th grade. We graduated together, and worked together for awhile after high school. I was in her wedding. She and her husband, who is also a dear friend of mine, and his family, moved to San Antonio in 1996 and I stayed in Washington. Though time has taken us to different places, we never stopped being friends. She was a very loyal friend, very good to me. She always saw the best in me.
We all knew the surgery was serious...tricky. Isn't every surgery? You just never know. Even so, it came as a shock to us all. It still seems surreal to me. I have had to call other friends from high school and old coworkers that she was friends with, and everytime I talk to one I want to call Jen up afterwards and say; "Hey! guess who I talked to?!" ..But I can't.
Everything makes me think of her. Old country songs that come on the radio. Candles. Fuzzy socks. Counting tills at work. Random stuff, I know.

Just because you have gone through grief before, doesn't make it easier. It's a different person, a different part of your heart that they occupy.

Jen may not have been my sister, but she was like one. I have known her for so very long. So many memories are wrapped up in our friendship. It makes me feel like little parts of myself are being torn away, and that one day my history will be all gone. It is true that the fabric of our lives is made up of people.

There are other things I can't talk about yet..in detail. Jen & Daniel connected me to their families and other friends. There are others with whom we have memories and it is impossible not to think about those other people right now as well. I wonder if I can even be friends with those people, without Jen. Will that ever not hurt?

Last fall, I followed a prompting in my spirit to go to San Antonio. I had reconnected with Jen & Daniel after a long absence. I lived with them for most of the six months I was down there. Who could know?
I thought I was there for other reasons, and that my time with them and Daniel's family was just an added bonus. Praise God that He knows things we don't know. It is because of His great mercy that I was able to spend that time with my friend. I spent Christmas and Thanksgiving there with them. Jen and I went out to breakfast on Christmas Eve. I keep thinking about that day. It was such a good day, shopping and hanging out. I remember feeling really blessed. It is a joyful memory, in the midst of sadness.
I am glad, after all, that I sometimes do crazy things. You know, like moving to Texas for "no good reason." :p
Maybe it is a blessing not to be so bound to things or places, that we cannot follow a feeling like that. There is always a reason. I hope in the future when things are hard, that I can remember that. Maybe Jen will be my reminder.

What else can I say? My heart just hurts. Grief is a process. I was not able to be with those that I love in SA for the memorial. I hope I will be able to see them all again soon, although it will be hard to be there without her.

It has been a long week and I am very drained and tired now.
That is all I have it in me to share.

C-Span, Debates, Wall Street, Oh My!

So, I had most of an entry written about my own personal politics, but I just didn't feel like it.
What it comes to right now is that I am irritated. I don't know who I am going to vote for. I tend to vote conservative, but I don't want to vote for a party so I keep my mind open. I both like and have concerns about Obama and McCain. Right now I think we need a change no matter what it looks like. Having said that, I take voting very seriously. I worry about voting for the wrong person, even if I am just one little vote.
I am from Washington, which means that most of my state is voting for Obama. The democratic candidate could pretty much torture children and kick puppies and we would still vote blue. So, even if I decided not to vote for Obama, would it really matter? Of course, I am going to vote how I feel like I should vote reguardless. Even if it doesn't matter.

I feel very torn this year, which isn't normal. I couldn't stand wishy-washy Kerry and there was no love lost for Gore either. I would have voted for Bush as the lesser of two evils either way. I guess it is not cool these days to say that you voted for Bush. Noone likes him anymore. The Republicans are just remaining tight-lipped, trying not to incriminate themselves further. No matter what McCain and Palin do, they are never going to get out from under the Bush stigma.

I just keep watching debates and reading whatever I can, and hopefully I am getting closer to being ready for November 4th.
At this point, if whoever elected doesn't screw things up worse than they already are, I think we got an okay deal. Unfortunate to think that way, but there it is.
It's all very frustrating. And that's all I feel like saying right now.