It’s been a weird month, though it started out fine. My father-in-law died. The death was expected. He lived a long and useful life, leaving behind amazing children and their progeny. My husband and I traveled 6,000 miles to attend the celebration of his life.

When returned home, I was stunned to learn that our neighbor’s son had died. He was in mid-fifties and left behind three teenage children. He has many brothers, two of whom traveled to California, where he died, to take care of arrangements and help the family return to New York for the annual family reunion.

My husband and I traveled 1 mile to attend the celebration of our neighbor’s son. Granted, it was two weeks after his death, and the siblings spent that time healing, but the circumstances were not agreeable to the gut instinct.

Now, this family exhibits an extremely powerful sense of family. They are bonded by a cement of love and integrity. They keep each other in the line of helping themselves and others to be productive.

One of the brothers told me, “My wife and I became grandparents for the first time, this morning.” They truly did not let the death eclipsed the goodness and life and happiness.

Life and death are part of the human existence. The happiness and sadness that can come with life and death can also be reserved, as we know, some births are not happy and some deaths are, therefore, I used this coincidence of life and death as a wakeup call to look for the life of happiness.

My husband asked me later, “Did you notice Jeff’s toenails? They were painted with flowers.”

I can just see his daughters and nieces honing their artistic skills before the celebration of life. What beauty. Happiness is alive.

Quoting “from science & religion to God”

“When we look to the flesh for life, we find death. When we look to matter for comfort, we find discomfort. When we look to the physical earth for truth, we find impermanence and confusion. Now, turn away from flesh and earth and look toward Truth and Love, the origin of all happiness, harmony, and immortality.”