The Thompson Family

Mother's Day Weekend in SF ~ May 2006

Our dear friend Chris Hanson passed away today after a long battle with cancer, at the young age of 53. She was too vibrant and beautiful, too wonderful and funny, too honest and generous to go -- we will all miss her so.

Last night, I happened across this poem (in the book I just started called "The Time Travelers Wife"), and my thoughts were instantly drawn to Chris... then this morning, she is gone, and sadness is here.

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

—Derek Walcott