Going to a wake tonight. Can't say it's the youngest child ever mourned by me - in my family, we mourn miscarraiges, and youngest of those mourned -still mourned- is my very own son Rudy (yes, for every person reading who knows me - believe it or not - it was Q in Spring 1990. Yes, before anyone else, the person who wants children more than anyone you know - was actually sonned before anyone I know except for those who got their girls pregnant in HS. My son would have been 18 this year - the same age as Gf's daughter). But young frenz of ours are facing such a terrible loss - just unimaginable.

Bestly written by Rocky, it's staggering. I'm way old enough to think about my own death a bit too much, but to lose such a wonderful life force - five years old - is just way beyond imagining.

I fully know that we'll all die eventually. Not happy that I face the immenant loss of many loved ones - and that eventually my family, my frenz, everything will be but a memory @ one future point. But she was too young. Never experienced college. Never get to see the Sox. Never get to experience one of Pasolini's good films.

Life is very very short. But, in all truth, I've run it dry by my counting. I haven't experienced anything in life - except for life itself. And I so wish the wee lass had experienced even 1/100th of life that I have. She would have been even more superior than her parents could ever know - even she could ever know - but now, we'll just have that briefest of glances to keep with us. This is life.

Her poor parents. I fully realise that MY sundry troubles in life are almost certainly tied to my brothers death when I was two (my proofs include that my oldest three sisters are rather well adjusted - and then there is me and my youngest sister, the very young when he was dying. Yeesh. Something was in the water- well, death was in the air). They have to get over their grief and @ the same time make steady the path for children. That stunning feeling of loss and emptyness, crawling and scraping @ the breath in the neck - it must be fought and dealt with and defeated. We will all die, but it's the life in us now that we have protect, nurture, and flower for all others.