The day I dedicated my post to Marika...

I found out some really sad news this week and I have been trying to get my head round it for the last few days. If you read my posts regularly you will know that for the last 4 months or so I have been volunteering in a charity shop. On my first shift, and quite a few subsequent ones, I worked with this lovely old woman called Marika. She was eccentric and wonderful and told me such interesting stories about her life. Sadly her husband had terminal cancer and she was caring for him, despite her own health problems. A few months ago her husband, David, passed away. I hadn't seen Marika for a long time as she suspended her volunteering at the charity shop whilst he was particularly ill but I had been keeping up with how she was from a fellow volunteer who knew her well. About a week ago I decided to write to her, so I sent her a card letting her know how much we all missed her at QEF and how sorry I was for her loss. I went into the charity shop on Thursday and found out that she passed away 3 days ago. I wonder if she read my card, I wonder if she knew how important she was to people or how much of an impression she made on my life even in the short time we knew each other. I didn't know her very well and our connection in life was brief but nothing better reminds you of the fragility of human life than the passing of a friend. I want to dedicate this post to her, and the following poem:

Everything passes and vanishes;

Everything leaves its trace;

And often you see in a footstep

What you could not see in a face.