A few years ago I took ago I took Qi Gong classes at my local Y. Among the participants were a woman,, M, and her adult daughter, S, who was the mother of a school-age daughter, A, who was too young to participate in the classes. Regarding M and S, I thought, "How nice that a mother and daughter are taking these classes together, although sometimes I thought M was being overly protective. S was very thin and often said her lower back hurt. I told her that one yoga technique was to simply bend over, resting torso on thighs and lowering head toward floor. (We were seated during this portion of class.) She tried it and said it brought some relief and did it again during the next several weeks of classes. I occasionally wondered why a woman so young and slim could have such severe and frequent back pains but never asked because I didn't want to pry. Then for a few weeks M and S were missing from classes. One week our instructor told us that S had died from cancer. I went back through the online obits to find hers. After her diagnosis she had embraced alternative therapies and shamanism. Mary returned to class a few times, really to say goodbye to us and say that A and her dad were doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances. That was the last I saw of M until few weeks ago when she appeared in a yoga class ((My Y no longer offers Qi Gong.) The class was too hard for M, but I told her about some other classes that are better for an older beginner and she has been coming to some of them. She now meets her granddaughter when she gets off the school bus and cares for her until her father gets home from work. The point of all of this is that yes, life continues, but sometimes it takes a few years to get back on track and head in a new direction, though of course she will always miss S. And I'm aways delighted to see M when she comes to a class and happy that she didn't give up after her first too-hard yoga class.