It's often easy to look at my life and be filled with petty grievance, annoyance or irritation. My neighbor’s kids are shouting in the pool. A client cancels last minute. I have a cavity. But then I have to remember how good things really are.
Today was a glorious sunny day and as I parked my car near my office, my eye spotted a man delicately and gently coaxing his wife – who was clearly paralyzed – into a wheelchair. I watched them do this exquisite dance, where he led her shoulders while stepping back and one of her feet dragged forward. They did this two-step fluidly, again and again, until she was safely in the chair. I nearly burst out crying because what I saw in that parking lot was absolute devotion despite tragedy.
And I’m annoyed because someone beeped at me earlier?
An hour later, I was online, researching and found an article that caught my attention. It was about embracing change. I was struck by how well it was written, noted the author’s name and decided to Google her. Only to discover that she died in 2012 at the age of 56 from metastasized breast cancer. I read her obituary in the New York Times and an article she wrote for O Magazine about living with cancer, which, I soon discovered, she’d had for 25 years.
