Well, life has moved on in these last couple of weeks. After finding out we owe a large amount of tax from the sale of our business, the shock has somewhat worn off. Retrospect is always so much clearer. My brother-in-law is a CPA and specializes in the sale of businesses. My other brother-in-law is the CFO of a company. My husband and I could have asked them if there are capital gains when sale proceeds roll back into a retirement account.  We didn’t, instead naively assuming that there were none.

Nothing to do now but move forward and start paying it off. Do the next thing in life, today, next week and next month. That’s what this blog is about. Things happen and it “just is what it is”. Keep moving forward.

Our challenge is not as bad as the current news feed articles talking about the earthquake in Turkey.  The death toll has climbed over 30,000. I can’t even comprehend the pain in the extended families that lost loved ones in that earthquake or are still anxiously waiting with diminished hope that they will be found alive.

Closer to home, I recently found out that a former neighbor, someone I liked enormously, died of cancer a year ago. I knew she had breast cancer years ago and had beaten it. I remember I brought her a blanket after her surgery because she had brought me one years earlier when recovering from back-to-back colon surgeries. I was in terrible pain and the day she brought it over to me, I felt the warmth of her compassion. I still do when I think back on that day. She was a kind person.

I was fortunate though; my issue was precancerous and so I recovered and went on with my life. I still have her blanket though; in fact, it is the blanket I use as a throw when I am sitting in my favorite recliner, writing a blog.

Alas, I got caught up in the business. I let the years go by and lost track of my friend’s new address after she moved from our neighborhood. I could have texted but didn’t, so I lost touch with her. I didn’t know until a few weeks ago when my son talked with another friend from our neighborhood, that the cancer had come back, and she lost her life.

I have her obituary now on my phone and I can’t bring myself to delete it. If I click the “X”, I feel I am deleting the pain that her twin young-adult kids have over the loss of their mother or her husband for his wife. I keep the article open, and whenever I run across it, I look at my friend’s picture on the obit. I see her smiling in the picture in the way that I remember, and I know that despite having to work on paying off the tax burden over the next years, I am still fortunate.

To my friend M.R., you didn’t deserve to leave the world so young. You beat cancer the first time and I thought you were always going to be ok. I know you would rather be still here, cheering on those terrific kids you have as they go through life.

Going forward, I’m going to appreciate what I have in life. I have a job at the university that I wanted and thus structured hours which allow me to write. I have my health, grandkids…I have so much. My husband and I will make sure we still enjoy life while paying off this tax debt. I can do this. Take the next step. That’s all I have to do.