She would have graduated this month from college

Every Sunday I get a report on who visits the blog.  I see there are people with Smith College addresses  looking ... we are all probably wondering why Elizabeth didn't get to graduate with you all.
All around NYU parties were taking place last week, and young women walking around with graduation gowns.  I try to feel happy for them without feeling sorry that Elizabeth isn't among them. It is just plain impossible.

I saw my next door neighbor, six months older than Lizzy, and she is a grown woman.  She is ready to start out in the world now, like so many of her friends.  Good luck, you all!

A mother of a Smith graduate sent me this picture from the program.

5 comments:

  1. Hugs. Hugs and peace,
    Claire

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  2. We would have all been there with pride for such a wonderful young woman, friend, niece and cousin! We miss her so much!

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  3. May was an impossible month. There are no words...

    ~Caroline Kabell

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  4. Dearest Patty,
    While Lizzy may not be among us as we want her to be, I promise she's present. It is with her memory that I overcome each fear in the deluge of fears the real world bogs us down with. It is in honoring her, in awe of all we know she would become, her magnificence that was sure to blossom, that I find my strength to not let life pass me by. Nothing could feel more present than that. All to say, she lives on in many of us and who we are becoming.
    I'm thrilled to see that you are thriving again as Lizzy would have wanted.
    I wish you and Richard all the joy that you can wish.
    A friend

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  5. Thank you, friend, for this thoughtful response.

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How Dina Aunty relished her memories. Mummy and Daddy were the same, talking about their yesterdays and smiling in that sad-happy way while selecting each picture, each frame from the past, examining it lovingly before it vanished again in the mist. But nobody ever forgot anything, not really, though sometimes they pretended, when it suited them. Memories were permanent. Sorrowful ones remained sad even with the passing of time, yet happy ones could never be re-created—not with the same joy. Remembering bred its own peculiar sorrow. It seemed so unfair: that time should render both sadness and happiness into a source of pain.

> From A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry