Yesterday Mom called me. She started out the call with, “I need your advice on something.”

A good friend of Bud’s passed away this week. They’ve known each other since high school; she’s been battling cancer almost that long. Bud is in Korea for the next 2 weeks serving his Guard duty. We weren’t sure how to get in touch with him.

Mom wanted to call his girlfriend to get her take on things, but neither of us had the number. I left her a message on her myspace to have her call me. Mom talked to her first and then she called me. We knew that if anyone did hear from him, he had to be given the news. It would upset him more to know we didn’t tell him. It looked as if the job of telling him was most likely to fall to his girlfriend as we figured he’d call her first. It was not a job she was looking forward to.

He posted on his myspace today that he’d heard; I’m not sure how. He’s in a tough place- he can’t come back for the funeral, and he’s in a foreign country with little support. (The Army doesn’t give hugs.) I wish we hadn’t had to tell him this news. I wish there hadn’t been news to tell.