one of those moments

I just had one of those moments that made me acutely aware of how incredibly grateful I am for everything I have in life.

I am working on a project with two wonderful women, one in the UK and one in South Africa. Really, they are so smart, professional, and thoroughly nice, and it has been such a delight to work with them, even though I only really know them through their voices on the phone. Today on a call with the South African lady (the head of our little team), I learned that the UK lady's husband has only a few months to live-- my boss was asking if I would be willing to pick up the slack, should the UK lady have to drop down her hours somewhat. I am stunned. This nice British mom with two little kids is losing her husband, having to juggle work with moving them into a single-story house, getting home health care, saying good-bye. They are on a 5-week international trip right now, and I had thought how lucky they were (those Europeans!) to have so much vacation, but now it makes so much more sense. She was taking her family away, to make sure they had as much time together as possible in these final months.

I can't stop crying over the realization of how thankful I am that I have a husband who is young and strong, who will (God willing) walk through the door in an hour for lunch.