It isn't the color yellow making me sad........

There is no need to go to mamby pamby land to buy jocoeveryman some self confidence.

I have been enjoying a little break from blogging over the holiday. I've spared you the typical holiday crap. You are welcome. Tony, I'm generous all year long btw.

Anyway, I felt compelled to stay up tonight and write a bit because well, I'm feeling a bit sad tonight and I wondered if anyone could relate.

I'm sad tonight because I learned a person I was very fond of yet had lost touch with died. Another friend gave me the heads up and it truly set me back a bit for the rest of the day.

It is kinda strange because I haven't talked with this person for like 10 years but we had the typical Linkedin and Facebook relationship that you have with people you knew in another life, another time. You know where to find them but you don't go out of your way to do so.

Then I felt bad because I was like why do I have a right to feel so bad about this.........I let the relationship meander away over time and over distance. We both got busy with marriages, work, family, being in different cities.

She was a very special person. I knew the moment I met her years ago I'd have to rearrange my mind and soul to make room for her.

While we met long, long before blogging.....or really even Al Gore's internet, she was a very successful wine and food blogger and writer. We shared a passion for wine and she had an amazing palate and an uncanny way of being able to demystify it to people who were less experienced.

She died this week. She died of cancer that she fought heroically for several years. She was like my age. I read she was concerned that she was letting people down because she couldn't fight anymore. It is about the only thing that really makes me feel old. People my age who die. I'm always like WTF?

Is it fair to miss someone and grieve for losing them when you haven't in fact been involved with them in a decade?

I tell my kids that "fair" (or fare) is what you pay to get on the bus........that there really isn't fair.....but there is injustice for sure in the world.

Well, I was proud to know her for the time I did. I reflected today on some of the fleeting interactions and time when shared.....fondly........mostly recalling her quirky humor, her confidence and her warm, easy and disarming smile. She was in a word brilliant. Tonight after the rest of the family has gone to bed I've opened a bottle of very nice.......but not cultish Napa Cabernet because she would abhor it.........and am quietly drinking it and thinking of her. Cheers Chris. Be at peace my friend.