It's simple, really.

A good friend of mine said to me the other day "I haven't been up for reading it [this blog] lately. You have to be in the right state of mind". So I looked through my posts and realized, they are mostly heavy topics dealing with the emotional consequences of working with the dying. While those topics are what affects me the strongest, they are not the only ones that affect me.

It reminded me of when your best friend starts dating someone you haven't met. The stories that are told are the ones that are the most extreme... or make for the best story. How great they were on Valentine's day; how awful they were on their birthday, etc. How often do we talk about the every day things that make the relationship important?

The thing that has affected me the most recently has been quite simple. It hasn't been what the client has said, or the pain they are enduring. It has been what has been sitting on his bedside table. There are three containers carefully dividing the client's favorite candies. When I first saw the bright orange of the jellied orange wedges I smiled. There was something special about those candies. Next to the orange wedges were handmade nut rolls in a ziplock bag. They looked delicious. I couldn't stop smiling at the thought of the sweets on the bedside table.

When I was walking through the hospital later that week, I saw across the lobby into the gift shop. There was a rack of bagged candy and at the top were the orange wedges. My legs were on auto pilot and the next thing I knew I was handing over a $1.36 for the confection. The sweet citrusy scent brought that same smile back from the other day. Nostalgia... that's what it was. The simplicity of these candies reminded me of my grandparent's house. They had a special jar in the window that held butterscotches. The cellophane bag reminded me of the days when my parent's would give my sister and me their spare change and allow us to walk to 'the candy store', which was the convience store. They reminded me of some of the simple things that seem silly to talk about in comparison to 'the big things' in life, but they are the things that make the relationship important.