Like a Candle Snuffed Out Too Soon

A bright and beautiful candle was extinguished this past Friday. A young girl, just 15, lost her 14 month long fight with leukemia, and left this world. Because I don’t know how her family would feel about me posting her name - even her first name - in my blog, I won’t. I did not see an obituary in our local paper, neither in print nor on-line. She was of South Asian descent, and perhaps in that culture, published obituaries are not done. So I will leave her anonymous.

We learned about her from Nancy, mentor on the spring team, a fellow Hodgkin lymphoma survivor, and my teammate on last year’s spring team. Nancy gave us our mission moment yesterday, and what a sad recollection it was, of this bright young girl, exceptional by all accounts. Of how hard she fought for over a year. Of how she got straight A’s last year at the school where Nancy teaches, despite only being physically able to attend class for a month. Of how the only thing this girl cried about, with all of the horrific suffering that dying from leukemia entails, was the fact that she might not live long enough to receive her Middle Years Program certificate. There were a lot of sniffling sounds from our somber band of TNT teammates when Nancy finished speaking, and it was not because of the cold start to the day.

As I walked and ran my two miles yesterday after our mission moment, I thought of all of the many things that this girl and her family have been cheated of by this vile disease. It just is not fair. Young people are not supposed to die of leukemia at age 15. All I could think of is that this girl was like a beautiful candle that was cruelly snuffed out way too soon. May she rest in peace, and may her grieving family and friends get some measure of comfort from all of the good memories of her, and by knowing that her tremendous suffering is over.