Today I am lunch-time blogging from the cafe on the 5th floor of my building, where they are piping in Dean Martin singing Santa Claus is Coming to Town, and where I am trying to find a quick minute to celebrate the life of someone who came after me and left before his time. Today is the 5th anniversary of the death of my nephew Jussie, but I am not sad today, I am full of joy for having been given the chance to have him in my life, for being his gooberish Aunt Bebe, with the brightly flowered pants. Yesterday the Ronald McDonald House of Dallas opened at new house, and in the path around the playground is this stone, my sister emailed me this photo this morning and I was filled with such a rush of love, a flood of Jussie's stories, I smiled. This week I have been in New Mexico at a Tribal Summit, and I found myself in conversation with a friend whose close friend is dying of cancer, and he seemed at a loss of what to say to his friend. I found myself remembering a conversation with Justin, a conversation where he told me the thing that he missed most when he was diagnosed with leukemia was the everyday interactions, the joking, the teasing, the football games, simply being treated as himself, and not the boy with the leukemia. How this admission from a 15 year old boy touched me and profoundly changed the way I reach out to others who are sick, no longer in shocked sadness but instead I strive to make a real human connection. Cancer sucks. It's not fair. It makes no sense what so ever. It simply is and no matter how hard we wish, sometimes it takes those we love and we grieve. We grieve always, and when we are damn lucky, we remember in love. I reached out to my friend and I said, what I learned from my nephew, was that what is most important is to just be there, treat your friend the way you always did and let him know that he counted. Jussie you are missed, you counted and today I wore a really obnoxious outfit, just for you.