Perspective

Late Friday night, as I was in a cab zooming down 3rd Ave on my way to a bar with some visiting friends, I was painfully told by my sister that my cousin had just been murdered by her ex-boyfriend, who then pointed the still smoking barrel towards his own head and ended yet another tragic life.

Upon hearing the news, I was in complete shock. No one can prepare themself for an event of this magnitude, for a story so unbelievable it feels like you are watching and episode of Law and Order. Friday night an atrocity against human kind was committed, one of thousands that happens each year. How could someone be so selfish and so full of hate that they could destroy something that is so beautiful? Life is so delicate and tender that it must be held with the softest of hands. Its grandeur and joy should be respected and admired, not brutally thrown on the floor to be shattered into a million pieces.

I only saw Claire once a year [on the most celebrated of Loring family holidays, Thanksgiving]. I still enjoyed my time with her, whether it was listening to her and my brother get into discussions about politics, or recalling the now infamous time in which her and my brother thought that they were cavemen and she decided to call him 'Bellyache,' a name that still sticks with him to this day, or listening to her updates on her most recent performance of jazz singing.

You never really know what you have until it's gone, something that particularly applies to your family. Family can so easily be taken for granted, and when something as unspeakable as this happens it can really bring you back down to earth and force you to realize how much they really mean to you. Even though I only see some of them once a year, I always look forward to Thanksgiving and being together with them. As our numbers now decrease by one, I know that from this point forward I will have a profoundly different outlook on this time of year and will attach a new significance to 'spending quality time with the fam'. While you may always be stuck with your family, you will also always be blessed with them, something that has now become so apparent to me.