My friend's mother died from an Aneurysm the other day. At the wake I sat near the front of the room where her family greeted people, joking and laughing. Many people, both young and old, showed up to pay their respects to a woman who became a mother to more than just her son.

An elastic band held back his reddish-brown dreadlocks in a large ponytail. A full red beard covered his face, masking the emotion that his unrevealing hazel eyes also did not show. People hugged him and people cried for him, the whole time it was he comforting them. A long way from the kid with coke bottle glasses that I remember from high school. Always reminding me of a cartoon character never seen without a "forty" of beer in hand.

People came to say their final good-byes, one after another. The line stretched all the way outside into the dim cold night. Some cried, some knelt silent, other stood around the roomful of chairs and laughed a laugh of sorrow. I sat with his ex-girlfriend and another friend of mine and waited; I don't know for what. Maybe I waited for the pain to show on his face so I could help him; maybe I was just waiting for my turn to be him. My mother has Multiple Sclerosis and every time it comes out of remission it gets worse. She is taking medication that is supposed to keep it away but it comes still. One time it just might take her life like my friend's mother or it might just claim her body but not her mind.

These are things I never really thought about before. Why would I want to think about something like that? Something that might never even happen. Still, I found myself overwhelmed with thoughts and emotions that I have never dealt with before. How does death just take people without warning, a mother so young? A mother so much like mine.