Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

This isn’t the life I had planned, and in a lot of ways it isn’t the life I wanted. I didn’t want to lose my dad when I was 9. I didn’t want be widowed at the age of 38. I never thought I’d lose my mom, who seemed invincible.

But this is the life that I have. It’s the only one I get.

And in spite of everything, it can still be beautiful.

Sometimes it’s just harder to see it, that’s all.