RetroPost: 9.13.05

{Saved from Xanga} My brief blurb of self-pity from yesterday was so selfish and pointless. Especially now, with all these floaties of life's fragility dancing around my head. Three months ago, I wrote about my classmate, Shelby Ako, dying. Not just dying, being raped and murdered. I was really shaken around that time, having someone I had been friends with in junior high, someone so full of life taken like that. I hadn't seen her since graduation or really even spoken to her through high school, but it hit so hard... Well, I just found out that her little sister, Chassey, died on Saturday. Heart failure. Unbelievable for someone so young. She graduated last year. It makes me feel so sick. I didn't know her at all. Oh my god. I can't even imagine how the family must be feeling right now. When someone dies too young I can't help but wait until I reach whatever age they were and think about how much longer I've been able to live. My first experience with young death was when I was 11 and the sister of my best friend died after a really heinous car accident. She was 16. It was one of the first things I thought about when I turned 16. I think about her every March first. Knowing I've been able to live five years longer than she ever got to makes me feel a little sad and very blessed. With Shelby, as long as I made it to August 11, I got to live longer that she ever did. With Chassey, she was younger than me. Forever young. Life is so precious. I want to go home and love my husband and enjoy our time together with no regrets hanging around. There's no time for regrets. What if yesterday afternoon, he had died on his way back from dropping me off or on the way to or from his class? My whole life would be spent wallowing in the fact that we had a horrible fight about something so trivial and I never got to see his smile again. "Live every day as if it were your last, because one of these days, it will be."