Within the last 3 weeks or so a lifelong friend of mine died suddenly (my religious friend) and now my work dispatcher has died over this last weekend. Our dispatcher had really bad diabetes that included foot surgeries, heart surgery, etc. and ended up life flighted to a hospital where his system started shutting down . Today they had a celebration of his life at a local VFW. My boss arranged for most of us to go support his family there and we had other corporate people come in to support our work crew as we went. I think it was a good thing in family support . Very thoughtful.

Now is the part where I turn this into sort of a rant. I care about people and there was a concern among many of us about our work mates final expenses. They had little money as his medical needs ate it all up. Did he even have insurance? Nobody knew but our corporation is working on it. I made the mistake of sharing these concerns with a woman who was brought in to work with us today. Big mistake. Here is where it gets crazy. She apparently thought I am an old man wondering if our corporation is going to pay for his burial. Where in the hell did that idea come from? Do we know any corporations that are paying for employees burials? What would you do if the survivors had other plans? I did not say it but wanted to scream out "you stupid dipshit twit. How could you possibly twist my words and my concern into this crap."

The saving grace on it all is that I took my turn paying respects last as I went home. I could talk with others about our dispatcher, they had pics of him there, and I discovered that I actually knew his wife because we used to work together years ago. It was a perfect time to go over concerns with her and suggest possible help as well as her and I getting caught up on our own lives. Thankfully they are already following some of the leads I provided. Others are helping and coming up with ideas. A religious local funeral home owner I know will bend over backwards to help them. Times of need like this should all be about helping others.

Before I left his wife told me that one time he told her that when he dies he wants to be a tree. I said, why not. If that is his wishes, why not. She said the kids are handling most of this but they are all thinking about it.