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Sunday, July 19, 2026

MY LIFE: Part 3F: Gratitude....Not Grief

A beautiful day in Honolulu, and life is wonderful.  My view as I compose this posting.

If you have been with me recently, I'm into a series called MY LIFE, now in Part 3, my retirement years.  Coincidentally, I'm in the middle of Pearl's Ashes, ceremonies I performed at the Taj Mahal (to be 3G), Machu Picchu and other global sites.


Why this specific topic today is that I was looking at these now blooming African Blood Lilies, and thought back to this day, July 19, which also happened to fall on Sunday...Pearl's final day.

  • She was perfectly healthy until around mid-June of 2019, when she appeared somewhat exhausted.  Her doctor recommended that she go to Kuakini Hospital to get a small series of tests.  For some reason, they gave her an anti-biotic injection, and that led to her body overreacting.  So she was told to stay overnight for observation.

Regarding Pearl's fatal period, a month into her ordeal, I received a bill just from the hospital in the neighborhood of a quarter million dollars.  The thought of her being on a ventilator for another few months, if not years, tormented me.  Not only was she suffering, but her family and I seemed to be declining, physically, but more psychologically.

I had purchased a bottle of Dom Perignon for her return, and actually obtained a Casio electronic keyboard to surprise her with a recital.  Well, I started with page one, "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," but after a couple of weeks, just could not learn it.  So I went to page 88 and tried Pachelbel's "Cannon in D."  I had even more difficulty.   I've always wanted to instead get a keyboard with sets of rainbow colored keys, which would light up when I am supposed to press it, to accelerate the learning process.  Well, I haven't yet seen colored keys, but I noticed that Casio now sells keyboards with keys that do light up...for $260, which is about the price of one of my extravagant lunches, or a typical hotel bill for one night.
I more recently in AGT2017 saw Jokgu (a chicken) playing America the Beautiful on a piano.  So I made a quick search to see how this was accomplished.  There was a clip of this chicken playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and the secret was that the keys lit up when they had to be tapped.  

I have a special and sad memory linked to that tune and a keyboard, which underscores my particular dedication to overcome.  I thought, I could do what Jokgu did, so the next day went online and bought a 61-key Electronic Keyboard, which comes with 128+ instruments and 4000 programmed songs (where the keys light up).  Let's see, now, two years later, and I still can't perfectly play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.  A common joke at 15 Craigside is that someday I'll put on a theater recital.
  • Back to my topic of today, it was also a Sunday, and Pearl passed away.  I recall holding her hands...a final grip...then death.
  • I returned from the hospital at around 11AM on Sunday, 19July2009.  This was one of those rare days when I did not post a blog.  However, I was able to submit an article to the Huffington Post with the title Gratitude....Not Grief.
  • From yet another posting:

2009 was the worst year of my life.  I spent a little more than a month visiting my wife who was in intensive care.  I remember being given an invoice showing a bill of $250,000 for hospital costs.  Just the hopelessness and her condition were bad enough, but what if this went on for, say, six months?  If only a 10% co-share, that would be $150,000.  She did pass away a few days later, and I remember walking home that Sunday.  I wrote Gratitude...Not Grief, borrowing from Thornton Wilder, which The Huffington Post published the next day.  It ended with:


Anyway, life begins again for me, and do feel refreshed. Please join me in thanking Pearl for making our lives so much better. She would want me to end on a positive note, so I again quote Thornton Wilder:
"The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude."

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