Each day is a gift

Swiss death notices have always fascinated me. Often several appear for the same person put in by their families, employers and organizations they worked for. The smallest might be 1/32 of a page and like one today, that touched me, they can go up to half a page.

The notices list those who miss the “defunct” with messages or not along with funeral information.

The picture of Yolande caught my eye. She was a pretty woman with short blond hair and wearing one dangling earring. Her smile radiates. I suspect she was a blond, but the black and white photo doesn’t tell me.

Her family tells me she had “quit” them in her 52nd year after a long and bad illness, which she supported with courage and dignity.

But above the message and the list of her survivors is a letter she wrote. I will give a loose translation.

“If you think I’ve quit you too soon, you’re right but this long walk in the glade filled with shadows and light where I have been cradled gave me permission to live unforgettable moments intensely.

“To all my entourage, I leave with hope of having communicated to you all my energy, my joy in life and my strength. Know that it is with much humility that these lines have been written to send to you this message of deep love. The world is peopled with marvelous persons.

“I thank everyone, especially my children, my parents, my family and my close ones. I can never thank enough my doctors (she names them) which was an incredible meeting and for allowing me to live a serene life with my cancer.

To you, who have supported me with exemplary courage, when you think of me, never forget for an instant to live in the present for each day is a gift.”

She died March 1. There are five other notices of various sizes from the places she worked and clubs she belonged to. There is a notice from where her father was a president. One was from Nice in France.

Outside my window the bise is ripping through the trees. The sky is a strange ribbed grey with the light shinning through to make the evergreen outside my window almost luminous.
I have writing to do dressed in my old jeans and sweatshirt, my feet toasty from the radiator behind my desk. Tonight is my book launch where hopefully I will see old friends that I have invited. My housemate and her son are helping me. My housemate is bustling around downstairs filing papers. There is harmony all around. Each day IS a gift.