Life is unjust

...feeling that way yesterday and tonight after hearing that the 10-year-old son of a friend of mine died of brain cancer yesterday at 12:30 p.m. His name was David John English and he is the son of my buddy Eric from college (Mom and Dad, you may remember that we took Eric, Missy and Carla out for dinner during graduation weekend). Eric's wife, Kathy, stitched the quilt that hangs over Rachel's dresser.

Kathy had posted regular updates of David's condition on Facebook and so we followed his journey from somewhat good health to pain and suffering. He died 19 months after his brain tumor was diagnosed. He has a 14-year-old sister, Holly.

Kathy always included funny, poignant things David did or said even when he was very, very ill. It was astonishing how his first worry was always whether he was inconveniencing the family and how he hated being a burden to them. Other times he wondered why he, a 10-year-old boy, had to go through what he was going through. I wondered that, too.

David had a stuffed bee from childhood that he kept around, and Kathy built a whole brain cancer awareness theme around it: "BEE strong." I got a bunch of construction materials to make some bees for David, a project I wanted to do with Rachel, but we never seemed to find the time. I deeply regret that.

I woke up this morning and thought of David being gone, and I started crying. I met him once as a baby when I was driving cross-country to UMich for my fellowship but hadn't seen the family since. As a wise friend of mine said today, hearing of a child's death is a whole different thing when you're a parent yourself. All I could think of this morning was how I'd feel if I lost Rachel. It would be like losing a limb. Or worse -- I wouldn't be able to go on, because what would be the point?

I'm having a hard time understanding the universe today.