Sunday, April 16, 2006

Birthday, Easter, accidents and grief

BIRTHDAY!

First of all it's LittleAngels second birthday today. Hooray, hooray, hooray! As a present she got a small wooden pram. Next Saturday , when we throw her party, she'll get a brand new doll from her Grandmother.The two-year-old with her new pram.

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EASTER

Here's an article about Swedish Easter traditions
It's kinda like Hallooween. Kids run around dressed as witches or mages and beg for candy. I can also tell you that I'm one of those people scoffing eggs. I love boiled eggs, not quite hardboild and not quite raw, but somewhere in between. There's almost nothing that tastes as good as eggs and some "Kalles kaviar" on a piece of bread. I could eat that all year round if I wanted to, but for some reason I save it for Easter, Christmas and Mid-summer.

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ACCIDENTS

There have been a couple of fatal accidents, like this one. Easter, together with all our other holidays, is a time when people seem to lose their minds and drive like madmen. It's really sad that it's become so important to cram as much fun as possible into every single holiday. People try to get there as fast as possible and end up dead or injured instead. I'd rather be late than not there at all. A holiday is a time to relax, not to get all stressed up because you want to do more exotic things than your neighbour.

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GRIEF...



This is the hardest part to write about.

Ever since I became a parent for the first time, I've noticed that I involve myself in other parents fate. I, who usually never cried about sad stories, have become a real weeper over time.

For the last month I've been following the fate of a little boy called Tille. He died last night, at approximately a quarter to eight. I just can't imagine the struggle his parents went through. I don't know if I would have been that strong.

Tille
(courtesy of Aftonbladet.)

I found out about his death late last night and I started to cry. A lot. I could do that because everyone else was asleep.

Tille was six months old and had a genetic disease called Epidermolysis Bullosa. (WARNING! There are strong pictures at that link.) He's not the only one. TLC/Discovery Channel aired the show "The boy whose skin fell off" last year here in Sweden and I admired Jonny Kennedy's life-long struggle and bravery.

Even though I admired Jonny, and was moved by his story, there was still this "detachement". It was a bit too far from home to really get to me. Tille wasn't. I could follow his mother's blog everyday and take part in her thoughts and struggle.

Epidermylosis Bullosa must one of the most vile genetic diseases there are. I wish there was more that I could do. For once in my life I wish I was a religous man and thus being able to seek comfort in whatever faith I had. But my faith lies in humanity itself and our ability to fix problems. That's why I write about this, to tell more people about this disease. To ask you to give money to research about this disease. It's rare, but it's there. And it causes more pain to those stricken by it than we can ever imagine. Help those kids.

4 comments:

Virginia Gal said...

Happy Easter!

Thanks for informing us of this horrible disease, I had never heard of it before reading your blog. My prayers are with that poor family, may they find some comfort in knowing their little boy is no longer in pain on this Earth.

Shark-Fu said...

Oh, my heart just breaks for that little one. I saw the special on Discovery about the young man in England and it was so very inspiring and sad at the same time.

Thanks for writing about this and the family is in my prayers.

Anonymous said...

Where are you? Your fans miss you! We never got to hear about the final story of what's going on in your marriage! :)

Good luck with school. :)

PissedOffPencil said...

Thank you, Linda for reminding me about my blog. :)