Time
December 3rd, 2022
You wake up thinking it’s like any other day, maybe slightly different than the day before. You may be doing something totally different than yesterday, but it’s just another day. Then you receive a text that someone that you just texted with the night before has died. One of their last texts was to you. They told you they weren’t feeling well and then that night, they died in their sleep. I’m still trying to process it. My friend Pam died. I met her in Logan Square when I did a show there back in 2007. She worked for a law firm. She came down to the lobby where I was set up and shopped. I mean shopped. Bought a few necklaces and wanted a bracelet to match. I remember her calling me the next day and asking, “You live in Swarthmore? I live in Ridley Park, you can just drop off the jewelry to me if you want instead of mailing it.” And with that we became friends. She had a home show for me back in 2008. We hit it off. She loved culture, traveling, the mountains and the city and she was loyal to Spitfire Designs Jewelry from 2007 until she passed away.
Pam was a knitter and she knit me the most beautiful sweaters. I wear them with a lot of necklaces I’ve made in my photos. They are gorgeous and true works of art. Back in October, she had me come over and she gave me several sweaters and scarves that she knit. She also gave me a whole bunch of jewelry supplies. Years ago, she had gone to a gem show with me and started making jewelry just for fun but never got really into it. Knitting for her came first. She told me, “Hol, it’s time for me to get rid of things. Ya know? I can’t keep all of this stuff I’ve accumulated over the years.” We spent several days together since September. She was with me at The Brickhaus in September and then at Bunny Hare’s in October. She told all of the ladies who work at Bunny Hare’s how happy she was. How in love she was. I also saw her at the Swarthmore Makers Market and we were going to go see The Nutcracker in Philly in December.
Two friends of mine have died in the last few months. One went in for a routine procedure and a few days later she was told she had endometrial cancer and then they found she had two brain tumors as well. A fellow jeweler, she had such talent but in one sweeping moment, everything had changed. Time stopped. After being diagnosed, she had passed away in a month. She was 55 years old. We used to talk about music and this guy she dated in college that she thought she still had a crush on even though she was married. She hadn’t completely gotten over their young love. We were like two young girl’s going over their recent conversations. It was funny and it kept us entertained. But what’s not funny is that she is gone and she worried so much about how her mom died from cancer and did everything she could to ensure she was not going to succumb to it, too. I feel so sorry for her husband. She was mostly at home and he worked from home. What an awful transition for him.
We think we’ve got it all figured out. That we can outsmart something, pray it away, make it better but in the end we are all just vulnerable animals. Animals whose numbers could be plucked at any given moment. People who are going to die no matter what we do, or try not to do. It’s an uplifting blog, isn’t it? But it’s true. We’re here for a moment in time and we don’t know when that last moment will be. We go around worrying and planning for things that may never happen. So, we might as well just live in the moment. Live, love and laugh in the moment. Pam had told me two days before that she had never been happier. After decades of being single, she finally met someone back in 2020 and in her late 60’s, she fell in love and vice versa. She never expected it and it happened. She said to me, “It’s never too late, Hol. I thought I was going to be alone for the rest of my life and then I met him.” And two days before she died she said to me, I am so happy. Happier than I’ve ever been” and then she died alone. She and her love were supposed to move in together next year. They were waiting for the right time. I looked to her like a big sister. She was the sister that I gained when my sister passed away. There were years where we hadn’t talked, or where our lives took twists and turns, but she was always there, with kindness and compassion if needed.
I think back to the night we were at her place in Ridley Park in October. We talked for hours. She was so deep. I love deep people. We both hated small talk. She never stayed up late, but that night I left her place at 1 am. She was usually in bed by 8 pm. The solace I take is that she died in her sleep the way most of us wish we could die and I know for a fact that she was happy and that’s all we can ask for. To be happy. I miss you, Pam. I miss texting you and talking to you and just knowing you are here. I’ll see you on the flip side one day, but know this, I love you. I know you know that. This getting older shit sucks. The older you get, the more you lose those you love. She said to me Thursday, the day before she passed away, “We did it, Holly. We made it! We’ve been two single badass women who have taken care of ourselves. I raised a son as a single mom who worked a full time job in the city and you started a successful business and you’ve taken care of yourself in spite of whatever has come your way. We are strong.” I’ll never forget that last conversation. I hung up feeling this sense of calm knowing she was in my life. I had no idea.
I think of Pink Floyd. It’s funny how life is truly just a circle. You come back round to things you knew and loved from long ago. I used to live and breathe Pink Floyd and I found this song at the age of 15 to be so…real. Because it truly is especially now that I am 52. Pink Floyd knew exactly how it was going to go and how it truly is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwYX52BP2Sk
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today. And then one day you find, ten years have got behind you, no one told you when to run, you’ve missed the starting gun.
And this…….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNruQ0WWYCQ
Turn around for something better. Children give up don’t you ever. Remember that the devil’s clever…hmmm.
I could go on and on with songs.
I’ll add one more just because. It’s such a great tune. It’s oh so Bittersweet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wyd9OcI37AY
