Black Day

My father taught me years ago that time is a flexible entity without beginning or end. As humans we label this flexible non-congruent factor so our finite minds can understand an infinite concept.
I wrapped my mind around that in differing degrees and at different times but no more so than this past few weeks.
On September 11, 2001, the world stopped turning and life as we know it changed forever. That date will forever be seared in many of our minds. On September 11, 2009, I received a kidney from my older brother. My world that was starting to turn more slowly than ever before catapulted me into a place I never thought I'd be. A place where I had a future. On September 11, three years later, I received and then lost a pancreas transplant when I bled into my stomach and the transplanted organ died. The lowest I've ever been in my life since my father's death, was on that day.
Black Day, for my family for the past 26 years has been May 2, 1989, the day I found my father's dead body on the front lawn after school. Some years were dark and painful. Black being the most accurate description I had. Some years we cried, remembered, held on to one another and survived. Some we laughed, missed him, and kept holding on. This past year, May 2, 2014, I was in the hospital with a tube in my stomach, recovering from another pancreas transplant. Once again being offered a future I was never supposed to have.
This year I spent "Black Day" with my donor's family. I laughed with his sister. Adored his funny, strong, caring younger brother. worried about his unborn niece or nephew. Shopped with his fiance and hugged his mom and dad until they probably wondered how they'd get rid of me. It was a "black day" in many ways, marking my father, as well as Colby's deaths. Perhaps in the future this day will be labeled by something besides the loss of loved ones. Perhaps, someday, this day will be the beginning of new families, friends and memories for all of us.
For now, if the day is a bit black, it is merely the void of our own lives we remember those we love sharing with us and look forward to the time when they, themselves will fill it once more. A little blackness makes the light much brighter, gives us the dawn to look forward to and reminds us that even in the darkest of nights, God leaves the stars on so we are never alone in the dark.
This black day a few more lights came on in my darkness. A few more lights and lives touched mine and left their flames burning in my soul. I still miss my dad fiercely, the ache that accompanies his absence has never gone away. The lights of others soften the darkness, bring light love and laughter and make each day a little less black.
My light still burns because of the tapestry of love and labels woven through time. Each flame lights the world every time I share it, and by those who light up my life, and fill the darkness until the day will no longer be black.