It is with a very heavy heart that I write this post today. I’ve just learned that the world has lost a truly wonderful soul. Someone I’m proud to say I knew for some 30 years. We were and are, ‘brothers from another mother’. I love you big man and words cannot describe how much you will be missed.
Give them hell up there boet.
When you reach a certain age, death becomes an all too familiar occurrence. Something you don’t really pay much attention to in the early years of your life. Each time you lose a loved one, you have those initial few days of realisation of just how fragile life is. How one minute someone can be upbeat and optimistic, and the next, they’re just not there. You may even decide to do something to change your life. But within a few days, life continues as ‘normal’.
So are you living, or simply existing? Is a question I’ve asked myself several times previously due to losses of loved ones. And each time the answer was, ‘I’m existing’. What I mean by this is that I was simply doing what I needed to do to pay the bills, playing it safe. Yes, I enjoyed my career in IT but I was always restless. My passion is for photography (which we’ve covered) and it was a constant niggle in my head. I was working and earning a fair salary, but I wasn’t LIVING. I have done very little travelling over the past 10 years (only a few weekend breaks here and there) due to workloads and the strange looks received when I requested more than a week off work. Pretty much the same routine day in day out. Existing became boring.
This sudden and unexpected loss of a loved one reconfirms my decision that despite how scary this transition to full-time photography is, as much uncertainty and risk there is, that it is the right thing for me to do. Not a single one of us has any clue when our time is up, so forgive often, love openly and make SURE you are happy with your life.
“The trouble is, you think you have time” – Jack Kornfield
This is one of my favourite quotes and I have a couple of canvass prints around my home with it on. It has never rung truer than today. You take it for granted that you will see your family, friends, colleagues tomorrow. But it is not guaranteed.
So let me urge you, if you’re not on talking terms with someone important in your life, reach out to them, make things right between you. Forgive them unconditionally and value them. Never be too busy to speak to someone you care about. Never assume ‘tomorrow is another day’.
R.I.P My Brother.
Nameste.