No Expiration Date

I just can't stop thinking about the newest young widow of my acquaintance. I first met her when she was about 5 or 6, and looking like she had just climbed out of a Norman Rockwell painting. She and her younger sister were bouncing up and down an Hawaiian beach like two Golden Retriever puppies, and it was fun watching their little round, apple-cheeked faces grow progressively more golden, their already blonde hair get even more incandescent.

They were flower girls at a wedding, and they were little troopers. And every time I think of her growing up and marrying and having a beautiful baby and then becoming a widow a few days ago-on her birthday-it just guts me. At this time of year, everyone's focused on new beginnings. Tomorrow, this young woman must go to a funeral carrying her 6 month old son who will "know" his father only through photos and videos.

I need a time machine. I would set the dial for 1987, and I would go back to that beach, and I would try to find a way to warn that little girl! I would tell her that sometimes, even when people leave, and you can't see them anymore, they are still with you, and you will see many signs that prove it. I would find the age-appropriate terms to explain that sometimes you will feel so much pain you would do anything to make it stop. But eventually that pain will make you very strong, and you will feel even stronger than Superman or Wonder Woman!

And I would tell her that there is always, always a reason to keep living. Always.

But of course there's only one time machine available, and it's called Tomorrow. And there's only one setting: Plus One. Add another day. And another. They might both be horrible. A hundred of them might. But there's a hidden, 100 percent, money-back guarantee:

Time may expire, but love never does. Never.