For My Uncle

Hey everyone. This is another one of my apology posts, and it isn't related to ultimate. As some of you may know, I've been in California for the past two weeks for my job as a resident adviser with JSA at Stanford. So far it's been the time of my life. I really do love my job, my kids are funny, and my co-workers are amazing. For the first time since ultimate ended, I'm genuinely very happy. Two or three days after I arrived and started my job, I called home to find out that my Uncle Yanic had suffered a stroke and my Aunt Nancy has cancer.

I've filed this entry under 'random' because that's what it is.

My Uncle Yanic was one of the healthiest people I know. He ran and he biked. He ran marathons and triathlons. He ate healthy and he didn't smoke or drink, really. Then he has a stroke. I had just seen him the Sunday night before I left. He was healthy and laughing with all of us, and it was a great time. That was almost two weeks ago. Earlier this evening, my Uncle Yanic was taken off life support after suffering massive heart failure this past Wednesday. The doctors say he's basically brain dead at this point, and I guess my family decided that there was nothing left to do. They're going to let nature take its course.

Massive heart failure. What does that shit even mean, you know? It's scary.
I don't know what to say. I'm not sure what to feel. One moment I'm laughing about the word "duty" with some of my residents, and the next moment I'm sitting in The Tank, head in my hands crying. I don't know.

It just goes to show you, you never know what's going to happen. Fate is cruel, but life is short. Don't let the cruelty of it sometimes get you down. I've been thinking about life a lot lately, because what else do you have to do when you're "stuck" in beautiful California?

Shit happens. I hate saying that, but shit happens. Shit has happened to me my whole entire life. But here I am today, surprisingly not totally fucked up, and a much stronger person. A lot of bad shit has gone down and I've been through some really hard times I think a lot of my oldest friends don't even know about. But I'm realizing now more than ever how amazing my life is. I love being out here, and this is my favorite job to date. I laugh every single day. I mean, gut-splitting, genuine laughter. It's the big things and the little things. I'm finally happy and feel "at home" in a place that isn't my home. Even Illinois doesn't do that for me.

I'll be going home soon, for a day or two, and I'm not really ready for it. Shit's going to hit me like a bag full of bricks, and I'll be back in a place where sadness is real. I'm not ready.

Anyway. That's it for right now. I'll get back to regularly scheduled blogging when I get the time to get my thoughts in order.


"And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years."
- Abe Lincoln