We knew it would happen, and we knew it would happen quickly, but it was still difficult to get the news that my husband’s brother had passed away.  And now he has been gone since the beginning of February.   And our lives have just kept on going.   It is strange to have someone that close to you, a sibling, be gone and your life just keep going, almost like nothing has changed.

We have a family reunion coming up next weekend, and when we are in small town East Texas, we always visit the resting place of my husband’s parents, one set of grandparents, and one sister (that passed before my husband was born) and now his oldest brother.  The stone is in place.  It will be hard and confirm in granite the reality of what we know to be so rudely true.