Thin Line

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They say there is a thin line between love and friendship and for American humorist Emma Bombeck, “There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt.” That minuscule thing that determines where one ends and the other begins, that border, matters a lot.

Today I learned something in the least unexpected way. We were seated in the waiting area near the emergency room of a private hospital this morning waiting for the result of the laboratory test of my nephew (he had his tooth extracted yesterday and was suddenly bleeding terribly last night until this morning despite medication , my brother got into panic mode so my nephew was rushed to the hospital). Then it happened… that moment of impact that made that can make your hands grow cold and damp, and your heartbeat   quite unstable. Inside the Emergency Room (ER) was a man who happened to be the brother of my cousin’s wife (talk about the six degrees of separation, the connection of each person to one another), he had a heart attack, just weeks after being released from the ICUfor the same cause. There he was battling for his life, traversing between the thin line that separates life from death, and within a few minutes, he was gone. 😦 The cries of the family members said it all, and the first thought that entered my mind was when we went to the hospital when grandpa died last year.

Just as the cries subsided, my thoughts shifted to another direction. There I was wallowing in fear for the upcoming exams in school while there are people who are facing bigger battles, mine is just a tiny spec, something that is all in the mind. There are people who no longer have the chance to pursue what they were going after, before taking that last breath. There are those who can no longer hold the hands of their children or their parent, nor kiss their loved one before going to sleep at night; gone too soon.

Life has no expiry date to let you know when the time is up so it is best to live it to the fullest. American business woman, Mary Kay Ash was once quoted saying, “Some people drift through their entire life. They do it one day at a time, one week at a time, one month at a time. It happens so gradually they are unaware of how their lives are slipping away until it’s too late.“

Every person must make every moment count, to collect memories and not regrets, to leave behind happy thoughts and not heartaches and to be closer to the one who gave us life. Don’t hold back, let the people who matter to you know how much you care, how important they are and how much you love them. Carpe diem!