{"id":931,"date":"2012-12-05T14:50:33","date_gmt":"2012-12-05T22:50:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/klaaskids.org\/blog\/?p=931"},"modified":"2018-04-03T14:47:50","modified_gmt":"2018-04-03T21:47:50","slug":"life-is-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/life-is-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Life is Good!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

With Polly & Ariel 1989<\/p><\/div>\n

L<\/span>ast night when it was dark and I was listening to Billie Holiday sing the blues, I read my sister Elizabeth\u2019s Facebook post, \u201c19 years ago today I had to say goodbye to my angel, my soul mate. Polly, I think about you every day and I will love you forever! I know we will see each other again… someday.\u201d Within a very few minutes I was seized in grief. Probably not the best time to listen to Billie Holiday.<\/p>\n

I posted my feelings, in the moment, on Facebook, though I try to avoid becoming too personal with people I don\u2019t really know. Then I reached out to my niece Ariel who was also online. I vented, I may have spoken inelegantly, but she listened and comforted me. Then I closed down my computer and continued to listen as the lady sang the blues.<\/p>\n

Slowly, I regained my composure and wiped the tears from my cheeks. Eventually, Violet came downstairs and I told her what had happened. She held me in her arms as we sat quietly. Finally, we watched a little TV and went to bed.<\/p>\n

This morning I opened Facebook and realized that thousands of people had responded to my post. There were expressions of support and sorrow that took my breath away. Ariel left a message that spoke to my heart as she had never done before. Somehow, my life suddenly felt validated.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know most of the people on Facebook who reached out to me, but their motivations were pure, good, and provided relief. My sister reminded me of the significance of a very difficult day and the importance of unconditional love.\u00a0 My niece was there to offer comfort during a difficult moment, and my wife held me when I felt isolated.<\/p>\n

Life is good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ast night when it was dark and I was listening to Billie Holiday sing the blues, I read my sister Elizabeth\u2019s Facebook post, \u201c19 years ago today I had to say goodbye to my angel, my soul mate. Polly, I think about you every day and I will love you forever! I know we will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-facebook","category-polly-klaas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=931"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3253,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions\/3253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.klaaskids.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}