No, there’s no rant today.  Today is Memorial Day and, as I have done in years past, I will give a little remembrance to the lives of those who have died.  Since Memorial Day last year, there have been two deaths with personal impact.  The first is my mother’s sister, Sue, who died last week.

 

Sue, as I knew her, had a passion for several things:  Art, humor and her daughters.  She was a teacher, a profession I have always admired and felt was underpaid.  She was also not one to hide her feelings; it’s a family trait I have strongly inherited.  Sue didn’t hold back on anything, as far as I knew.  She laughed hard and enjoyed life.

 

My aunt was involved in a family dispute about a dozen years ago, and it saddens me I haven’t seen her since.  This is not out of spite; it’s more a matter of me simply not making out her way.  The last time I saw her was at my grandmother’s funeral, and before that I am not really sure.  She simply wasn’t somebody I kept in contact with on a regular basis, and that is my shortcoming.  Sue had a full life.  She would have been seventy-five this fall.

 

The other death personal to me was my cat of fourteen years.  I mentioned this last fall, just before Thanksgiving, when she died.  It’s hard to memorialize a cat properly.  She didn’t do tricks, there was no particular stunt she pulled or thing she did which was memorable.  Shadow was, however, there.  Whenever I needed her, for fourteen years she was there.  This, really, is all one can ask of a companion of any species, and Shadow met and exceeded this requirement.  Six months after her death, I still miss her terribly.  Sylvie, one of my new kittens, is bonding with me much like Shadow did, but she is not Shadow and sometimes that hurts terribly.

 

I know Memorial Day is for honoring those who died in battle fighting in the U.S. military forces.  I honor them as well, but their loss simply isn’t personal to me.  No recent member of my family has been in combat, much less died in it.  My grandfather (Sue and my mother’s father) was an officer in WWII, but as far as I know he didn’t see any combat.  So I keep this annual post to those whose life meant something to me.  I hope next year I have no one to post about, but only time will tell.

 

Meanwhile, my life goes on.  See you tomorrow.