On New Information Please:

I was going through one of my old address books. It was bursting with index cards, business cards and scraps of paper. Hand written scribbles of names and phone numbers, email addresses and even some ‘We’ve Moved!’ notices.

I was doing this to clean out the drawer it was in and make more room for the newer people in my life.

As I went through the papers and pages, names of people I don’t associate with any longer and others that had died looked back at me. I wondered about the ones still alive when last we saw each other and remembered those not still here anymore.

I transferred some of the information to the new address book and card file. Realizing that my life really did change a lot after the death of my son and my cancer experience. I had a good long look at my life before and the information was set before me. I am not the person I was before life sent me in new and different directions.

Relationships with people I once hung out with didn’t hold the cohesiveness they once did. We may still do things we did before but the friendships are no longer there. Why?

I was willing to wait it out when they were grieving after the deaths of close relatives. Why didn’t they do the same for me? When they got older and ailments came to them, I helped them adjust and held them when they cried over lost youth. Why did my cancer scare them away?

I have new friends now but I tread cautiously. Expectations are lower and bosom friends are not on my near horizon. Time is needed to make them. Time that has not passed yet. I am a fierce friend to those that befriend me. But I have a book of broken relationships that did not stand the test of time.

I put the book in a plastic bag to keep it from spilling out into the other areas of the drawer and put it back in the drawer. I’m not ready to throw it away. I have more to learn from those broken fragments of my life. But I don’t want it spoiling the future of my new relationships.