in threes

i woke up early this morning and tried to decide what to do. i went to sleep with a fever and slept in a pool of sweat. i woke up sore, tired and hungry as the sun came up. i wanted to both start the day and go back to sleep. as i laid pondering the options, i sensed a feeling of dread. there was something wrong with the force. i hate when i connect with my yoda side, because it is normally a precursor to something bad that is about to happen. it's a bit past noon and i am well on my way to knowing why i wanted to stay in bed today.

the phone rang a few hours later. i had slept and woken back up. i was laying there trying to decide how to structure my day. i have an appointment later today that i wanted to cancel. i needed food and had no idea which of the limited choices to indulge. i listened to the conversation, by the third word i knew it was one of those calls you do not want to receive on a rainy sunday morning. actually, the feeling of dread lifted a bit when it turned out that the car accident that was being discussed was without personal injury. a mercedes coupe was broken, and a friend needed a ride, but the thoughts of hospitals and tubes were washed away.

i wasn't needed for this errand of rescue. this was a pick-up and drop-off. the first event was not over, but it was not a crisis.

that is when the second event came in the form of an email. the email was titled "tears" and included the words, "i took my life at 5 AM this morning". i looked at the time it was sent, midnight, just after i had fallen asleep. it was from someone who successfully accomplishes almost everything she tries. at that moment i believed i had found the dread of the day, my friend has been dealing with the crumbling of one commitment and had decided to commit to another direction. as i sat and looked at the words, i remembered my grandfather who took the ultimate control of his life, making a final statement, by controlling the time and place of his death.

i continued reading the words and found that the statement was made, but thankfully the act was not successful. the issue with friends who are overachievers is that you know they accomplish the things they set out to do. there was no regret, there was cold and hard analysis of the situation. there is clearly a desire to finish the project. overachievers learn from their mistakes, they get better at execution and they hit their goals. all thoughts that again remind me of my equally achieving grandfather.

the second event is not over, but the crisis is probably not going to be today. today is for the feelings of sorrow that someone i care about would want to select this as their next project.

the dread of the day has not abated. being a superstitious rationalist i am all too aware of the rule of three, and being a surfer i know that the last wave in the set is normally the largest. i am standing back and waiting for the last wave now. i am hoping the wave is not a tsunami, because i have no idea where the evacuation zone is. i would like to believe the wave is not coming, but as a long time rider of the waves i can still feel the set rolling in. now i know why my arms ached this morning,

my inner-yoda was telling me to paddle.

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people build walls to stop waves from washing them away don't they? like the walls in new orleans that collapsed and flooded the city. reminding us why walls need to be maintained.

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