The Cross and Pen

Suffering is part of the human condition.  There's a phrase about life - "no one gets out alive." Well, that's true. We all die. At some point this thing called life ends for all of us. A dash between two dates, our days are numbered. In the time we spend on this earth, one common experience we all share regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation is suffering. Whether physically or emotionally, we all suffer at some point in our lives. Our level of suffering may not be equal, but the experience of suffering is fundamentally the same in that it is universally understood.  Recently one of my best friend's father passed away. He had experienced a  litany of health issues during the latter years of his life. At the end, he developed leukemia, which later metastasized into stage four cancer that eventually took his life. While no man can know the heart of another, based on what I know about my friend and his family, I would have to say his father was ...