wow.

My cousin Angie died in her sleep last night.

She was way too young to die. She is younger than me! She has four beautiful kids and had her whole life ahead of her. 

I feel bad because we were never that close. Her family was always the cluster that lived far away and only showed up for Christmas every other year.

I have a very large family. My father is the 4th oldest of 15 kids. I have a hard time keeping track of how many cousins I have.... atleast 20 ..... 24 of us inlcuding me and my brothers... then there's our generation's kids ...... atleast 34 by now ..... the Zindas have always been good breeders (except me of course). This is just my father's side of the family, I'm not even counting my mom's side of the family.

Family dynamics are always complicated, that's normal. I've always had mixed feelings about family. The relationship between me and my father's family has always been strained because of my father. I got the short end of the stick as far as fathers go. He's not a good man. His relationship with all of his brothers and sisters has never been good and then when my mom finally left him and I refused to visit him all of our ties were severed. I regret that our parents' crap kept me from my cousins. I have more good than bad memories of our times together. In the last 4 years I've gotten back in touch with that side of the family and have not regretted it. A lot of my traits and qualities make alot more sense to me now and I value them more. I really regret all the years I missed getting to know my cousins. They will always share a closeness that I will never be a part of because they grew up together. I missed out on quite a bit. Even my brother's and I will never be as close as we should be because of our father. It really is a shame but I've taken steps in the last couple of years to build better relationships with the ones that matter.

I've not always believed that you build your own family. People have always tried to tell me that blood is what matters. I disagree. "Blood" is what brought you to life and in some cases, what can also make your life hell. Having sex and creating a child is not hard. Obviously, anyone can do it. Making a real family is much harder and takes constant effort and care. I now firmly believe that family does not consist solely of blood relatives.... it is often those people that hurt you the most. That is what I love about friendship.... you get to choose your friends and they are what makes up YOUR family. Sometimes, if you're lucky your friends consist of blood relatives. 

The friends I've had the longest and hold the dearest happen to all be blood.

I wish I had known Angie better but her presence will still be missed. I feel for her mother, my aunt, who is completely devastated right now. I cannot even begin to imagine what Aunt Betty is going through this very moment. They were very close and this came as a total shock. We still do not know why she died. All we know right now is that she had bronchitis, went to bed last night, and didn't wake up this morning. SO amazingly, shockingly sad.

What I do know is that her family is there for her. Some of this Zinda family cares about the rest and does what they can to take care of eachother. Even when I was separated from the family there were a few who kept in touch, knew where I was in my life's journey and I would get a phone call, or a card in the mail, or a surprise visit at my graduation. I never knew at those moments what that contact meant but now I know that simply meant that they cared. 

It's a family... it has its good and bad parts but this particular family actually believes that blood counts. I guess I'm lucky that they think differently than I do.

Death is a time for reflection. It's a time to re-evaluate what you believe and to look at what you're doing, maybe re-adjust your compass. Everyone handles death differently. 

I think it's sad to lose someone you love, someone you weren't ready to lose but death is expected. The timing is a surprise but not death itself. Everyone dies. I try to think of what that person gave to us and evaluate whether their life deserves to be celebrated or whether their death should be celebrated. Both of my grandmothers are gone, I celebrated their lives and miss them dearly even though one of them I never even met. Both of my grandfathers are gone and I celebrated their deaths because they were terrible examples of humanity and their only worthy contributions were the result of their sperm. When I die some day I hope that my life is celebrated, not my death.

I'm sorry you died before I knew you better, Angie. From what I do know, your life will be celebrated.