Circle of Life

This is Stephanie's "fake" engagement ring. I think they call it fake. I'm not too sure about that though. The original vintage sapphire ring broke and this is what Justin replaced that one with. So it's not really fake (as in... hell yes, that is a real diamond). I think it's beautiful. I've been wanting to get a picture of it.

However, the sadness is overwhelming today. I have to speak about it.
After a hard, stressful, emotional week.. as we were all getting ready to head out to JuJu's for crawfish with Carlyn and Bree (and Jax, her precious baby boy), Catherine discovered that our sweet little baby ducks had been killed by a cat this afternoon.
I can't even begin to describe how sad I was to see it. Ginger was still alive when we found them, but she had been mortally wounded and was unable to eat or drink. She lifted her head behind a ball when she heard Catherine coming. The girls were inconsolable. Evie, whose duck was Clover, the green one, declared that "there was too much green in the world". Caroline (Aqua the Blue's owner) did not want to see the color blue anymore.
It was positively horrible. When I closed my eyes, I saw it all over again. The poor dears. I feel responsible. I hate that I wasn't over there to protect them. I've never been so sad to have animals die as this event. It was a massacre. They were killed for sport and left to die. Ginger died shortly thereafter.

After JuJu's, we found out that Pam's (whom I fondly call my second mother) father had passed away this afternoon. So mom, dad, Kendall, and I went over to be with her. Thankfully, he had just fallen asleep and did not wake up. If you're gonna go, that's a pretty incomparable way to do it.

The circle of life brings joy and sadness. Lives begin, lives end. Earthly things pass away. There is a better place to store your treasure where moth and rust cannot destroy.